Prevention of leukemia and the increase of plasma levels of lipid-bound sialic acid by allogeneic bone marrow transplantation in mice.

AKR/J (hereafter called AK) mice treated by total-body irradiation plus syngeneic marrow transplantation developed a leukemia-lymphoma complex and concomitantly showed increased levels of lipid-bound sialic acid as was also seen in untreated AK mice between 6 weeks and 6 and 11.5 months of age. C57BL/6J (hereafter called B6) mice did not show a leukemia-lymphoma complex and did not develop elevated levels of lipid-bound sialic acid with aging. B6----AK chimeras, prepared with B6 bone marrow deprived of Thy-1,2-positive cells prior to allogeneic transplantation and kept in laminar flow isolation, did not develop graft-versus-host reactions, lived long lives (observations carried up to 13 months), failed to develop leukemia-lymphoma, and had persistently low levels of lipid-bound sialic acid. These findings indicate that introduction of resistance by marrow transplantation can inhibit development of retrovirus-induced cancer and also prevents an increase in levels of a putative cancer indicator.