Description of a murine B lymphoma tumor-specific antigen.

By using monoclonal antibodies, a tumor-specific antigen (TSA 41.5) was detected on the cell surface of a B lymphoma CH-1 tumor variant, CH-1.1. This antigen is not expressed by normal lymphocytes (spleen cells, lymph node cells, thymocytes, bone marrow cells, or blast cells) of B10.A mice, the host strain of CH-1.1, or by the CH-1 lymphoma. Immunoprecipitation and biochemical characterization of TSA 41.5 with the use of two-dimensional gel electrophoresis showed this antigen to be a surface protein of CH-1.1 cells with an Mr of 80k and pI of 4.6. TSA 41.5 is not related to the murine transferrin receptor, and not to gp70, a viral envelope protein expressed by CH-1.1 cells, shown by comparative peptide map analysis of these three proteins. TSA 41.5 is a surface antigen unique to the CH-1.1 tumor, which is not expressed by the 19 different murine tumor lines that were tested nor by spleen cells of 15 independent mouse strains. In addition, treatment of spleen cells with bacterial lipopolysaccharide did not induce the expression of TSA 41.5. These characteristics of TSA 41.5 make it unlikely to be a product of viruses. Additional evidence against TSA 41.5 being a viral protein was obtained by the observation that antisera against viral proteins could not block the binding of the anti-TSA monoclonal antibody to its antigen. In vitro treatment of CH-1.1 cells with anti-TSA monoclonal antibody specifically inhibited the in vitro growth of the tumor cells in a dose-dependent fashion. The CH-1.1 tumor and monoclonal antibodies could be a useful murine model system for the exploration of the use of monoclonal antibodies for the in vivo treatment of cancer.