Tumor immunity to murine plasma cell tumors. III. Detection of common and unique tumor-associated antigens on BALB/c, C3H, and NZB plasmacytomas by in vivo and in vitro induction of tumor-immune responses.

Tumor-associated antigens (TAA) were demonstrated on plasmacytomas derived from BALB/c, NZB, and C3H mouse strains, by in vivo and in vitro techniques. By immunizing the appropriate F1 hybrid mice with these tumors, it was possible to show that all the plasmacytomas expressed cross-reactive tumor-associated transplantation antigens. When cytotoxic lymphocytes (CL) were induced in vitro by the coculturing of syngeneic or F1 hybrid spleen cells with irradiated plasmacytoma cells, "shared" and "unique" plasmacytoma TAA were demonstrable. This was accomplished by inducing CL in vitro against one syngeneic plasmacytoma and assaying for lytic activity on a range of 51Cr-labeled BALB/c, NZB and C3H plasmacytoma cells in vitro. In a second in vitro assay, unlabeled plasmacytoma cells were tested for their ability to inhibit the lysis of a particular 51Cr-labeled plasmacytoma, with the use of CL induced in vitro against it. The possibility that these TAA were "self" antigens was excluded by demonstrating in the inhibition assay that they were not present on T lymphomas and spleen cells of the same strain, and that CL "autosensitized" in vitro could not significantly lyse 51Cr-labeled plasmacytoma cells in vitro. From both in vivo and in vitro studies of immunity to these tumors, it was concluded that any one plasmacytoma line possesses multiple TAA of both shared and unique types.