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Local irradiation of murine melanoma affects the development of tumour‐specific immunity
Author(s) -
Liao YuPei,
Wang ChunChieh,
Schaue Dörthe,
Iwamoto Keisuke S.,
McBride William H.
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
immunology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.297
H-Index - 133
eISSN - 1365-2567
pISSN - 0019-2805
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2567.2009.03084.x
Subject(s) - immunity , immune system , melanoma , cancer research , radiation therapy , immunology , in vivo , in vitro , biology , antigen , medicine , biochemistry , microbiology and biotechnology
Summary Radiation therapy affects the immune system. In addition to killing radiosensitive immune cells, it can induce functional changes in those cells that survive. Our recent studies showed that the exposure of dendritic cells (DCs) to radiation in vitro influences their ability to present tumour antigen in vivo . Here we show that local radiation therapy of B16 melanoma tumours inhibits the development of systemic immunity to the melanoma antigen MART‐1. This inhibition could not be overcome by intratumoral injection of DCs expressing human MART‐1 after radiation therapy, suggesting that a form of immune suppression might have developed. On the other hand, injection of MART‐expressing DCs prior to tumour irradiation was able to prevent inhibition from developing. These results suggest that local radiation therapy may block the generation of immunity under some circumstances and that strategies may be required to prevent this and allow radiation‐induced cell death to translate fully into the development of systemic immunity.