as noted above , an animal may be cloned ; however , the ability of a cloned animal to make a particular antibody having a particular specificity is a learned response . furthermore , the cloning process has not been demonstrated to also transfer the immunologic memory from the founder animal to the cloned animal . therefore , in order to increase the odds in favor of producing a cloned animal with the capability to produce the desired antibody having a defined specificity , a different methodology must be utilized such as that of the present invention . in particular , the present invention encompasses a method whereby lymphoid cells or lymphocytes ( e . g ., from whole blood , blood - derived cells , peripheral blood lymphocytes , splenocytes , lymph node lymphocytes or bone marrow cells including stem cells ) may be obtained from an animal ( i . e ., the founder ) having a desirable immunological profile ( e . g ., the demonstrated ability to produce an antibody having a particular specificity ). a founder animal is one that is known , following experimentation , to produce a unique immune response that is difficult to duplicate in other animals of the same or different species . fresh whole blood or cells derived from blood , lymphatic tissue or bone marrow are then suspended in freeze media containing nutrients ( e . g ., fetal calf serum ) and dmso ( dimethyl sulfoxide ) as a cryoprotectant and stored frozen in liquid nitrogen . once a cloned animal is available ( created by using the founder animal ), it may then be injected with fresh or preserved cells from the founder animal . since the transfused cells are genetically identical to the clonal host or founder animal , they should not invoke immune rejection and are expected to successfully repopulate the lymphoid organs in the host or cloned animal . as such cells contain immunologically competent memory cells , the stimulation thereof in the cloned animal , by in vivo challenge , will produce the desired anamnestic immune response of the founder animals . the need for the present invention is significant . such a need may be , for example , illustrated as follows : an essential and critical component of a diagnostic assay for t4 is sheep anti - t4 serum that is immobilized onto a solid phase ( e . g ., microparticles ). in combination with a conjugate made up of t3 ( triiodothyronine , an analog of t4 ) and alkaline phosphatase , the sheep serum confers basic critical quality attributes required to generate a distinct standard calibration curve and allow for an estimate of ft4 in patient samples . the serum is developed by immunizing sheep with t4 - tg complex . thyroxin ( t4 ) is coupled onto a protein carrier molecule ( porcine thryoglobulin or tg ), then emulsified in an adjuvant prior to injection into sheep . this is a classical approach to raising needed immune responses in experimental animals . historically , however , this method of immunization produced antibodies recognizing t4 molecules ; yet , in the great majority of instances , the resulting sera does not perform adequately in diagnostic tests . success of adoptive transfer requires that the source and the destination animals either be genetically compatible ( as in identical twins , clones , highly inbred species as is the case in some mice ) or the recipient animal ( destination ) be immunologically suppressed through the use of chemical agents and radiation . it is not readily understood if such a rare and unique immune response is dictated solely by the animal &# 39 ; s genetic background or to what degree the response is confounded by a variety of presently unknown factors . on the basis of theory alone , however , a large contributor to the uniqueness of such a response is the genetic make up of these responders . the low efficiency and unpredictable response is an obstacle to providing long - term resources and reagent safety stock and therefore jeopardizes the availability of test material . however , if an immunologic responder animal is cloned , in accordance with the present invention , the probability of raising a clone with immunologic potential similar to that of the founder animal is significantly enhanced . moreover , the adoptive transfer of immunologically competent lymphoid cells from the founder to the clone will further enhance the opportunity of duplicating the immune competency of the founder animal without the risk of immune rejection . in view of the above , one purpose of the present invention is to produce a cloned animal with the same immune capacity and immunological identity , as the founder animal with respect to a specific antigen . the transfusion may be preceded by , followed by or concurrent with immunization and / or boosting by an immunogen that has been demonstrated to illicit a particular immune response to yield the desired antibody specificity . other manipulations may also be attempted to increase the likelihood of producing the needed antibody depending on the success of this transfusion approach . for instance , one possible manipulation is to boost a sheep which has previously been immunized using t4 - tg immunogen , with t4 coupled to a different carrier molecule such as klh ( keyhole limpet hemocyanin ). the antibodies produced by the cloned animal may be used for many purposes . for example , the antibodies may be utilized in diagnostic assays as well as for therapeutic purposes . the present invention therefore will allow for the production of an endless supply of such antibodies without the concern of maintaining the desired immunological response of the founder animal . the present invention may be illustrated by the use of the following non - limiting examples : initially , fucosyl transferase transgenic mice ( or a group of animals of the same species ) are immunized with an antigen such as t4 - tg . the immunized mice are then cloned using fibroblast cells as nuclear donors . at adulthood , the cloned mice are then divided into two groups . immune splenocytes from the immunized mice are then obtained and transferred to the group i mice ( adoptive transfer group ). in contrast , naïve splenocytes are obtained from un - immunized mice and transferred to group ii ( negative control group ). both groups of mice are challenged with t4 - tg antigen . the antibody response or titer produced against the t4 hapten is measured in both groups and compared . if adoptive transfer is successful , group i mice ( animals transfused with immunologically trained cells ) show a secondary immune response ( high titer specific ) while group ii mice ( animals transfused with immunologically naïve cells ) show only a primary immune response ( low titer and less specific ), such as in vaccination . in particular , a vaccine is designed to train the immunologically naïve cells to become “ educated ” immune cells . once immune ( or educated ) cells counter a real infection , they respond more rigorously ( e . g ., higher antibody level , i . e ., higher titer ) and more specifically than an otherwise un - educated or naïve cell .
the subject invention relates to a method of transferring a specific immune response into a cloned animal . in this manner , one may create a specific , selective , secondary immune response in an otherwise immunologically naïve animal .