The use of immunosuppressive drugs in models of chronic rejection may limit their usefulness for mechanistic studies. We have developed a new minor histocompatibilitymismatched rat kidney transplant model without the need for immunosuppression. Kidneys from LEW (RT1 l ) donors were transplanted to congenic WF.1L (RT1 l ) recipients and compared with the reversed strain combination and isogenic controls. Urinary protein excretion was measured serially in all recipients; kidneys were harvested

more »

... 120, and 180 d after transplantation for morphologic analysis and cytokine gene expression. In vitro lymphocytic reactivity and cytokine analysis of mixed lymphocyte reaction (MLR) culture supernatants by ELISA was also carried out. LEW into WF.1L kidney grafts developed proteinuria starting 120 d after transplantation and were associated with morphologic changes of focal segmental