Treatment by CpG or Flt3-ligand does not affect mouse susceptibility to BSE prions

Dendritic cells (DC) have been suspected to play an important role in prion diseases. We evaluated the role of DC in a murine model of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) by the use of the growth factor Flt3 ligand, which stimulates DC generation, and CpG oligodeoxynucleotides, which induce DC maturation. We observed that pre-treatments or treatments with Flt3-L or CpG alter neither the time course of prion disease nor the accumulation of the protease-resistant prion protein in intraperitoneally infected mice.