title: Transfected human dendritic cells to induce antitumor immunity.
abstract: Dendritic cells are professional antigen-presenting cells able to prime naive T lymphocytes and regulate steadily the delicate balance between tolerance and activation during the immune response. In past years several reports have shown that genetically engineered dendritic cells (DCs) can be a powerful tool for inducing an antigen-specific immune response. The use of such modified antigen-presenting cells is a real working hypothesis in preclinical studies and in clinical vaccination approaches for cancer treatment. The definition of optimal transfection conditions for preserving DC survival and functionality is necessary to design a correct immunotherapeutic protocol. Different lipid-based transfection compounds were studied for their effects on DC survival, phenotype and functional properties. All the transfection procedures were able to select DCs with a higher expression of activation and costimulatory molecules (ie MHCII-DR, CD83, CD86, CD25) than the untreated DCs. However, only two compounds (LipofectAMINE PLUS and FuGENE 6), preserved or even increased the immunopotency of DCs as antigen-presenting cells. These protocols were applied to modify DCs in order to express an epithelial tumor-associated antigen, MUC1, and such cells were able to induce in vitro a specific immune response in healthy donors.
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Medicine and Pathology, Università di Roma La Sapienza, Italy.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Rughetti
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Biffoni
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sabbatucci
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Rahimi
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Pellicciotta
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fattorossi
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pierelli
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Scambia
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lavitrano
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Frati
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Nuti
mesh_terms: D019496:Cancer Vaccines; D002411:Cation Exchange Resins; D002470:Cell Survival; D002478:Cells, Cultured; D003713:Dendritic Cells / Q000166:cytology / Q000276:immunology*; D000939:Epitopes / Q000235:genetics; D005434:Flow Cytometry; D019084:Fluorescent Antibody Technique, Indirect; D015316:Genetic Therapy / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D008055:Lipids; D008081:Liposomes; D008213:Lymphocyte Activation; D018396:Mucin-1 / Q000235:genetics*; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000032:analysis; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; D014162:Transfection / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D019496:Cancer Vaccines; D002411:Cation Exchange Resins; D000939:Epitopes; C411955:FuGene; D008055:Lipids; C086724:Lipofectamine; D008081:Liposomes; D018396:Mucin-1; D012333:RNA, Messenger