Objective: To characterize the immunologic properties of an established mouse mammary tumor cell line MA891.
Methods: From a spontaneous mouse mammary adenocarcionma (TA2 MA891) of TA2 mouse origin, an in vitro passaged cell line MA891 was maintained in RPMI1640 with 10% new born calf serum. The immunogenecity of MA891 was studied by classical tumor transplantation rejection assay, generation of cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTL) by syngeneic secondary mixed lymphocyte-tumor cell culture (MLTC) and cytotoxic assay of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL).
Results: MA891 maintained the high metastatic potential of the parental TA2 MA891 tumor passaged in vivo. Transplantation rejection studies indicated that amputation of a hind limb with growing tumor in the footpad did not protect the mice from a second subcutaneous challenge of the same tumor. The cytotoxic activities of both CTL and TIL were shown to be very weak.
Conclusion: MA891 is a mouse tumor of very low immunogenecity. It can be used as a mouse tumor model for studying cancer metastasis in humans.