Enhancement of IgE-mediated histamine release from human basophils by viruses: role of interferon

The initial experiments were designed to see whether the incubation of viruses with leukocytes caused the release of histamine. Peripheral blood leukocytes obtained from both allergic and nonallergic human donors were incubated with HSV-1, Influenza A, and Adeno-1 at an moi of 0.1 or 1.0. After 24 h of incubation at 37°C in a 5% CO2 atmosphere, the supernatant fluids were assayed for their histamine content. As seen in Table I , the amount of histamine released into the supernatant fluids was not altered by the addition of either infectious or inactivated viruses to the leukocyte cultures. There also was no appreciable change in the cellular histamine content (data not shown).