Klin Onkol 2007; 20(4): 298-301.
Backgrounds: Tumor infiltrating lymphocytes are cells of the host immune system present in the tumor tissue. It has been demonstrated that they show an anti-tumor effect in patients with metastatic melanoma. Design and Subjects: The aim of this prospective study was to verify the in vitro preparation procedure of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes. Methods and Results: Seven patients with metastatic melanoma underwent tumor tissue biopsy. The tissue biopsy served for the expansion of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes in vitro in the presence of high dose of interleukin 2. During a 6 - 8 week period more than a 1000-fold expansion of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes from tumor-infiltrated lymph nodes has been recorded. Expanded lymphocytes are genetically stable and preserve their specific cytotoxicity to autologous tumor. They were expanded to more then 109 T cells. Such an amount of T cells can have a significant clinical effect when applied as cell immunotherapy. In case of primary tumor tissue culture, no expansion of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes has been observed. Conclusions: Expansion of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes to a clinical scale is feasible under sterile
conditions from lymph nodes infiltrated with tumor cells from patients with metastatic melanoma.
