Abstract
The present study was designed to obtain evidence concerning the nature of the target cells of human reagins in monkey skin. Rhesus monkey skin biopsies were incubated with ragweed atopic or normal human sera, washed and quick frozen in isopentane or embedded in paraffin. Sections were treated sequentially with ragweed antigen E and fluoresceinated goat anti-antigen E globulin. Sections sensitized with allergic serum showed specific cellular fluorescence in the dermis which was invariably absent from those treated with normal serum. On counter-staining with toluidine blue, the fluorescent cells were identified as metachromatically staining mast cells.
Footnotes
This work was supported by a grant to Lawrence Goodfrind from the Medical Research Council of Canada and was taken in part from a thesis presented by T. Hubscher to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research of McGill University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Ph.D. degree.
