Production of IL-12 from gene modified human dermal fibroblasts: a preclinical study for IL-12 cancer gene therapy

Abbreviations: IL-12, interleukin-12; RT-PCR, reverse transcription-PCR Cytokine has been used as an immune stimulator and administered to patients for a treatment of cancer. Interleukin-12 (IL-12) is a potent cytokine which acts through a variety of functions including i n t e r f e r o n-production and cytotoxic T-cell activa-tion. Considering the toxicity of high dose systemic IL-12 administration into human, local dministration of low dose IL-12 can be a more efficient strategy. In ex vivo therapy, human dermal fibroblast has been considered as a useful vehicle for transferring genes. Here we show that human dermal fibroblast transduced with retrovirus containing IL-12 gene can be manipulated to produce reasonable amoun