Allogeneic murine melanoma cell vaccine: a model for the development of human allogeneic cancer vaccine.

In an attempt to induce an immune response against tumour antigens, several groups are transfecting cytokine and other genes into autologous tumour cells which are given to the patient as a vaccine. This process is labour-intensive, time-consuming and expensive. Allogeneic cells would offer a more convenient vehicle for the delivery of cytokines and other molecules. However, current dogma suggests that MHC-matched cells are a prerequisite for an effective immune response. Using murine melanoma models we compared allogeneic and autologous vaccination and showed that the survival of C56BL/6 mice (H-2b) was prolonged with some degree of protection achieved against an autologous B15-F10 (H-2b) cell challenge when the mice were vaccinated with allogeneic K1735-M2 (H-2k) cells but not when immunized with autologous B16-F10 cells. Both vaccination with live and irradiated allogeneic cells induced an anti-tumour effect using only one immunization and no boost or adjuvant. Protection was not observed after vaccination with another melanoma (S91; H-2d) or with a carcinoma (A9HT; H-2k). Allogeneic vaccination promoted a cytotoxic cellular response against both the allogeneic and the syngeneic melanomas. This allogeneic vaccination model will be useful for studying the underlying mechanisms of protection, in both pre- and post-challenge settings, as well as for developing whole cell vaccination systems using genetically modified allogeneic tumour cells.