Vox Sang. zyxwvuts 15: 187-193 (1968) Demonstration of Leucocyte Isoantigens on Skin Cells by Means of Immune Adherence1 C. J. M. MELIEF, MIA VAN DER HART, C. P. ENGELFRIET, V. P. EYSVOOGEL and J. J. VAN LOGHEM Central Laboratory of the Netherlands Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service, Amsterdam Summary. By means of the immune adherence assay it was shown that specific leucocyte isoantigens present on lymphocytes, granulocytes and fibroblasts are also demonstrable on epidermal cells. This suggests that the transplantation antigens of lymphocytes are present on all nucleated cells. The immune adherence assay with epidermal cells is a simple and sensitive method and can, therefore, be used for the selection of donors for organ trans- plantation. zyxwvuts Introduction An increasing number of leucocyte isoantigens can be recognized serologically. At least some of these antigens are either identical with or closely related to the antigens that determine the compati- bility of skin- and kidney homografts [2,10,11,12]. Thus it appeared of interest to investigate if isoantigens, common to leucocytes and skin cells, can be demonstrated directly on both cell types. This was tried by an immune adherence assay, using the method described by MELIEF zyxwvut et al. zyxwv [8]. Immune adherence (I.A.) is the attachment of antigen-antibody-complement complexes to the surface of indicator cells, i.e. primate red cells and non-primate platelets [3] and granulo- cytes [7]. From previous studies [8] evidence was obtained that the LA. assay with lymphocytes detects the same (complement fixing) antibodies as does the cytotoxic antibody test with lymphocytes, based on dye exclusion. This research has been supported in part by contract No. PH 43-65-993 from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases NIH, U.S. Public Health Service.