Immune consequences of protracted host-tumor interactions in a transgenic mouse model of mammary carcinoma

A transgenic mouse model of autochthonous mammary carcinoma was chosen to study the impact of tumor progression on the immune system over an extended period. We found: i) that splenocyte numbers, particularly myeloid cells, increased concurrently with tumor burden; ii) the percentage of tumor-infiltrating Treg cells was similar to that in human breast cancer; iii) suppressed T cell proliferation and cytokine production and; iv) significantly elevated MCP-1 and TNF-alpha in the sera of tumor-bearing mice. The modified immune status in these tumor-bearing hosts is consistent with a "syndrome" that likely impacts the efficacy of cancer immunosurveillance and response to therapy.