Suppression of immune responses by herpes virus type 2-transformed murine tumor cells

Work done in our laboratories, using a murine model, indicates that suppression of host immune responses might be due to secretion of soluble factors by tumor cells. The H238 cells (BALB/c embryonic fibroblasts transformed by UV-inactivated herpes simplex virus Type 2) exhibit progressive tumor growth with subsequent decrease in lymphoproliferation. To further study the suppressive effects of a tumor, H238 conditioned medium (CM) was tested for its ability to block murine and human mitogenic and allogeneic lymphocyte responses. PHA, Con A and LPS were used as mitogens. Lymphoproliferation, in the presence of increasing amounts of H238 CM, resulted in a greater degree of suppression of [3H]thymidine ([3H]Tdr) uptake, in both human and mouse systems. The kinetics of proliferation in the presence of concentrated H238 CM (cCM) showed that depression was evident regardless of the time of cCM addition, thereby affecting it at any stage of the cell cycle. Treatment of H238 cCM using acid (pH 2.3), base (pH 9.6), trypsin (100 micrograms/ml), heat (56 degrees C, 100 degrees C) and freeze-thawing, restored PHA-stimulated lymphoproliferation. Dialysis of H238 cCM showed that the molecular weight of the suppressor lies between 15 and 25 kDa. Northern blot analysis demonstrated the presence of a TGF-beta transcript in H238 cells. Neutralization of the H238 cCM with monoclonal antibody to TGF-beta resulted in complete abrogation of suppressive activity in spleen cell lymphoblastogenesis. These results suggest that TGF-beta appears to be the main inhibitor of immune responses found in this HSV-2-induced murine tumor cell line. Such tumor-induced modulations may contribute to the outcome of immunotherapy in the tumor-bearing host.