A tumor antigen in tissue cultures derived from patients with Hodgkin's disease.

Pellets obtained from supernatant fluids of monolayer cultures of cells from patients with Hodgkin's disease were fractionated by isopycnic density sedimentation. Material in a peak of specific gravity 1.15-1.21 g/ml from two Hodgkin's disease cultures was used to immunize rabbits, and the antisera obtained in this manner were reacted by agar-gel diffusion and immunoelectrophoresis with antigens from the purified peaks and the unfractionated pellets of centrifuged culture medium from all the cultures. The antisera reacted with material from 9 of 10 lines derived from spleens of patients with Hodgkin's disease, 2 of 8 cell lines from histologically negative spleens from patients with Hodgkin's disease and with 3 of 6 lymphoma cell lines not diagnosed as Hodgkin's disease. The antisera did not react with 12 cell cultures prepared from normal adult and fetal spleen and thymus. The antigen from cultures from patients with Hodgkin's disease was not found in material sedimenting at lower specific gravities; it resisted Tweenether solubilization, and migrated as a single band by immunoelectrophoresis. The antigen was not found in disrupted, noncultured tumor cells from patients with Hodgkin's disease, and an antiserum against noncultured, minced tumor tissue did not react with the Hodgkin's disease tissue-culture material. No immunological relationship was found between the tissue culture antigen and Epstein-Barr, RD-114, or Rauscher murine leukemia viruses. The Hodgkin's disease antigen may be a tumorrelated antigen or a component of an oncogenic virus.