Ultrastructure of the attack of eosinophils stimulated by blood mononuclear cell products on schistosomula of Schistosoma mansoni.

Purified human eosinophils were treated with peripheral blood mononuclear cell supernatants containing eosinophil cytotoxic enhancing activity (ECEA). Schistosomula of Schistosoma mansoni which had been coated either with antibody (Ab) from the sera of infected patients or with the lectin concanavalin A (Con A) were incubated with ECEA-treated and untreated cells for 2 minutes to 12 hours and examined ultrastructurally. Killing was assayed at 18 hours. ECEA caused an increase in the killing of Ab-coated worms, but Con-A-coated worms were not killed by either ECEA-treated or untreated cells. Eosinophils began to degranulate on Ab-coated worms within 2 minutes and continued to degranulate, so that by 12 hours about half of the parasites had greater than 50% of their surface covered by discharge material. The ECEA-treated cells degranulated more than the untreated cells. There was much less discharge material on Con-A-coated worms than on Ab-coated worms. Eosinophils adhered to discharge material on the surface of both Ab- and Con-A-coated parasites. At 3 and 12 hours, lysed cells and cell fragments were also seen adhering to discharge material. In the absence of discharge material the cells adhered to residual glycocalyx or to the tegumental outer membrane. These studies suggest that eosinophils kill schistosomula by progressively degranulating onto their surface over many hours and that the increased toxicity caused by ECEA is due to an increase in discharge.