Does anybody knows why B cells are more susceptible to cytotoxic effects induced by chemotherapeutic agents (eg. gemcitabine) with respect to T cells?
Dear Giovanna, truth to say, I did not observe drastic effects of chemotherapeutics on relative number of T and B lymphocytes. Absolute number of lymphocytes was affected much more significantly. Concerning your topic I could see contradictory data in the literature:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15782312
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11956096
I think, your statement will be true if to look on T and B cell functions in immune responses. Activated effector/memory T cells are resistant to harmful agents due to expression of anti-apoptotic molecules. Moreover, under lymphopenia conditions naive T lymphocytes acquire phenotype of activated T cells. I have not idea, is this true for B lymphocytes? However, responses and viability of B cells are highly dependent on cognate interactions with T lymphocytes and this dependence takes place long time during B lymphocyte proliferation and differentiation up to plasma cell stage. Therefore, decrease in frequency of cognate antigen-specific T helper cells may be secondary factor that possesses harmful effect on B cell responses.
B cells have to become plasma cells vie several steps of cell division and clonal selection.
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