title: Hematopoietic potential of IL-2-cultured peripheral blood stem cells from breast cancer patients.
abstract: Patients receiving autologous transplants for various malignancies generally experience an increased incidence of relapse compared with patients receiving unmanipulated allogeneic transplants. We initiated a protocol for IL-2 activation of peripheral blood stem cells (PBSC) for induction of in vitro and in vivo autologous graft-versus-tumor (GVT) activity in patients with breast cancer. In this study we analyzed the effects of 24 h of IL-2 incubation on the hematopoietic potential of PBSC from these patients. Cells collected by leukapheresis were first cryopreserved and stored in liquid nitrogen, then thawed rapidly and incubated with IL-2 in a serum-free system for 24 h, with samples analyzed before and after incubation. Although there was a significant drop in mononuclear cells (MNC) (from 4.5 to 3.7 x 10(8)/kg) and CD34+ cells (from 12.3 to 7.5 x 10(6)/kg) after 24 h in culture, there was no significant change in colony-forming units (CFU) (from 12.5 to 11.5 x 10(5)/kg). Time to engraftment (neutrophils: < 0.5 x 10(9)/l; platelets: > 20 x 10(9)/l) was comparable to a cohort of similar patients receiving non-cultured PBSC transplants. These results indicate that mobilized frozen/thawed PBSC which have been cultured in IL-2 for 24 h retain adequate potential for hematopoietic reconsistution in this group of patients.
authors.affiliation: Bone Marrow Transplantation Program, Vincent Lombardi Cancer Research Center, Washington, DC, USA.
authors.forename: E M
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Areman
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mazumder
authors.forename: P L
authors.initials: PL
authors.lastname: Kotula
authors.forename: U N
authors.initials: UN
authors.lastname: Verma
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Rajagopal
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hancock
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Guevarra
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Djahanmir
authors.forename: R A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Sacher
authors.forename: K R
authors.initials: KR
authors.lastname: Meehan
mesh_terms: D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000097:blood / Q000628:therapy*; D002469:Cell Separation; D002478:Cells, Cultured; D005260:Female; D006410:Hematopoiesis; D018380:Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation; D006801:Humans; D007376:Interleukin-2 / Q000494:pharmacology*
chemical_list: D007376:Interleukin-2