Inflammatory cells in solid murine neoplasms. II. Cell types found throughout the course of Moloney sarcoma regression or progression.

Regressing and progressing Moloney sarcomas, induced in BALB/c mice by the injection of cultured sarcoma cells (MSC)1, were sampled for histologic analysis and then disaggregated using mixtures of trypsin, collagenase and DNAse or collagenase and DNAse alone. The types of inflammatory cells (IC) found in resultant cell suspensions were determined 6, 11, 14 and 18 days post inoculation. Inflammatory infiltrates were composed almost exclusively of three cell types; neutrophils, T lymphocytes and macrophages. The extent to which each was found in tumors was related to the time post inoculation. Neutrophils were part of an early acute inflammatory response seen in both developing regressing and progressing sarcomas. The onset of regression was associated histologically with the appearance within tumors of a mononuclear inflammatory infiltrate. T lymphocytes and macrophages were the principal constituents. A higher percentage of T lymphocytes was recovered at all sampling times from regressing, compared to progressing, sarcomas. During development of the mononuclear inflammatory infiltrate there were relatively more large T cells in regressing, than in progressing tumors, and the percentage of macrophages was higher. Thereafter, the proportion of macrophages in the recovered cell population was approximately the same for both types of tumor. Such equality was more apparent than real, however, since IC were restricted to the peripheries of progressing sarcomas after the acute inflammatory phase, but continued to be found throughout regressing neoplasms. The effective ratio of macrophages and T lymphocytes to tumor cells therefore was much lower in progressing sarcomas than was suggested by percentage figures. The data presented support the concept that T lymphocytes are instrumental in causing the regression of Moloney sarcomas, possibly through interactions with macrophages.