COMPARISON OF AUTOCHTHONOUS AND ALLOGENEIC BREAST-TUMOUR CELLS IN TESTS FOR LYMPHOCYTE IMMUNITY TO HUMAN TUMOURS

Summary.-Lymphocytes from 10 patients with breast carcinoma were seeded in autologous serum, on autochthonous tumour cells and allogeneic tissue-cultured breast tumour cell lines. In 4 patients, the anti-tumour cell cytotoxicity against at least one of 3 breast tumour cell lines differed significantly from that against autoch-thonous tumour cells. Further study of these 4 individuals (using their previously frozen lymphoid cells and sera) showed that these differences occurred because serum which decreased ( " blocked ") lymphocyte anti-tumour cytotoxicity when applied to one tumour cell line, could either have no effect or potentiate it when applied to another, without any consistent pattern vis-a-vis target-cell susceptibility to these different humoral effects. ALLOGEENEIC tumour cells which have been maintained in tissue culture are commonly used as target cells for in vitro studies of humoral and cellular anti-tumour immunity in man. It has bee