Dendritic cells fused with mastocytoma cells elicit therapeutic antitumor immunity.

Characterization of the spontaneous immune response that frequently occurs in tumor-bearing animals, as well as immunization using dendritic cells pulsed with tumor antigens, suggests that a limiting factor of the tumor-specific immune response may be a defect in the co-stimulatory signal that is required for optimal activation of T cells. In this work, we describe a new approach to improve the antigen-presenting capacity of tumor cells, which does not require a source of purified tumor-associated antigen. We fused P815 mastocytoma cells with bone marrow-derived dendritic cells. We obtained one hybrid that displayed the phenotypic and functional properties of dendritic cells and expressed mRNA coding for the tumor-associated antigen P815 A/B. Injections of irradiated hybrid cells prevented the growth of preimplanted mastocytoma and induced long-lasting tumor resistance.