Modulation of tumor immunogenicity of rat glioma cells by s-Myc expression: eradication of rat gliomas in vivo.

The Myc family proteins represented by c-Myc are thought to play a crucial role in cellular proliferation, differentiation, transformation, and apoptosis. In this study, we demonstrated the novel role for a Myc family protein in elicitation of immunogenic phenotypes in tumor cells. Injection of rat 9L or C6 glioma cells, together with the s-myc gene linked to the cytomegalovirus promoter, completely prevented formation of both brain tumors and s.c. tumors derived from the parental glioma cells. However, introduction of the s-myc gene had no inhibitory effect on development of B104-derived neuroblastoma. In addition, unlike the s-myc gene, injection of the c-myc or wild type p53 (wt-p53) gene together with glioma cells did not modulate the tumor immunogenicity and resulted in formation of gliomas in the animals. These findings suggest that s-Myc expression may stimulate the presentation of a tumor antigen common to 9L and C6 cells to T lymphocytes and augment the activity of the host immune system, resulting in prevention of glioma formation in vivo. This success in tumor eradication indicates the possibility of application of the s-myc gene for gene therapy of human brain tumors.