Cytotoxic T lymphocytes induced by syngeneic mouse melanoma cells recognize human melanomas

Abstract

The recognition by T cells of antigens displayed or presented on the cell surface is generally restricted by the products of genes in the major histocompatibility complex (MHC)¹. Thus, most cytotoxic T cells recognize antigens in conjunction with self MHC determinants, especially in the response against virus-infected lymphocytes², chemically modified self antigens³ and tumour cells⁴. In these situations, the majority of cytotoxic T-cell clones seems to recognize MHC determinants unique to the individual alleles (‘private’-type determinants). However, certain cell surface antigens seem not to be subject to such rigid MHC restriction^5–7. These apparent exceptions could be incorporated into the MHC-restriction model by postulating the involvement of public-type determinants of MHC as restriction site, but until now no cross-killing across species barrier has been reported in these instances. We now report that mouse cytotoxic T cells induced in primary culture by syngeneic melanoma cells killed various human melanoma cell lines in an antigen-specific fashion.