Detection of sensitized human blood lymphocytes by agglutination with basic peptides: a possible test for malignant disease.

A simple rapid micro-agglutination test for detecting sensitized lymphocytes from human peripheral blood is described: the poly-L-lysine (PLL) 3400 agglutination test of lymphocytes (PAL test). The incubation of lymphocytes from 30 cancer patients, 30 patients with non-malignant disease and 40 healthy controls with PLL (mol. wt 3400) is evaluated. The test was positive in 83 percent of malignant and 20 percent of non-malignant cases. All healthy controls were negative. Other peptides tested showed no significant difference in reaction between malignant and non-malignant diseases. The mechanism of detection of sensitized lymphocytes from patients with malignant disease through agglutination induced by PLL 3400 is discussed.