© 1990 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. Augmentation of various immune reactivities of tumor-bearing hosts with an extract of Cordyceps sinensis

In order to enhance general reactivity of immune system in the tumor-bearing host, we employed extract of Cordyceps sinensis (CSE) as a biological response modifier. Cordyceps sinensis is an interesting material produced by a kind of mushroom parasitic to larval moths and was used to hasten recovery from exhaustion in ancient China. In this experiment, C57BL/6 mice implanted subcutaneously with syngeneic EL-4 lymphoma cells were employed as the host. Oral administration of the extract leads to a reduction of tumor size and prolongation of the host survival time.As judged by plaque-forming cells against T-independent (sheep erythrocytes) and T-independent (bacterial lipopolysaccharide) antigens, CSE showed to augment the antibody responses.As for the activities of peritoneal macrophages, chemotaxis was dramatically depressed within a few days after EL-4 transplantation up to the end of life, but treatment with CSE at-14,-7,-4, +4, +7 an +/10 days after the tumor transplantation augmented the activity about four times stronger than that of control.Phag cytic activity of macrophages was also decreased in tumor-bearing mice treated with cyclophosphamide (100mg/kg) 3 and 5 days after tumor transplantation.But administration of CSE restored th