Cancer from Hell: Devil Facial Tumour Disease

Abstract

Event Abstract Back to Event Cancer from Hell: Devil Facial Tumour Disease Terry Pinfold1*, Gabriella Brown1, Alexandre Kriess1 and Gregory Woods1 1 Menzies Research Institute Tasmania, Australia Devil Facial Tumour Disease (DFTD) is a rare form of cancer that spreads like a contagious disease. It is a parasitic clonal cell line transmitted between hosts through biting. The disease is limited to Tasmanian devils, which are carnivorous marsupials endemic to Tasmania, an island state of Australia. It has a 100% mortality rate, has reduced the population by 80% and may cause extinction of the Tasmanian devil in the wild within the next 30 years. The lack of immunogenicity may be one possible mechanism used by DFTD cells to escape the host’s immune system. Because of the lack of molecular tools and limited access to Tasmanian devils we developed a mouse model of DFTD. The tumour cells are immunogenic as immunocompetent BALB/c and C57BL/6 mice rejected xenograft implantation of 10^6 DFTD cells while immunocompromised NOD/SCID mice accepted the xenograft and developed DFTD tumours. Evidence for the immunological basis of the rejection was demonstrated with adoptive protection by splenocytes transferred from BALB/c to NOD/SCID mice. In vitro stimulation of devil lymphocytes induced cytotoxic anti-DFTD activity. To determine if this could be effective in vivo, two NOD/SCID mice were co-injected with 5 x 10^5 DFTD cells and 5 x 10^6 stimulated devil lymphocytes. Seven weeks later the tumour growth was less than 10% compared to the control. Replication of this work with 10^4 DFTD cells plus lymphocytes failed to engraft the tumour providing insight into possible immunotherapy approaches for the disease. Keywords: Devil Facial Tumour Disease, DFTD, Infectious cancer, Tasmanian devil, Contagious cancer Conference: 15th International Congress of Immunology (ICI), Milan, Italy, 22 Aug - 27 Aug, 2013. Presentation Type: Abstract Topic: Translational immunology and immune intervention Citation: Pinfold T, Brown G, Kriess A and Woods G (2013). Cancer from Hell: Devil Facial Tumour Disease. Front. Immunol. Conference Abstract: 15th International Congress of Immunology (ICI). doi: 10.3389/conf.fimmu.2013.02.00604 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 12 Jun 2013; Published Online: 22 Aug 2013. * Correspondence: Mr. Terry Pinfold, Menzies Research Institute Tasmania, Hobart, Australia, tpinfold@gmail.com Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Terry Pinfold Gabriella Brown Alexandre Kriess Gregory Woods Google Terry Pinfold Gabriella Brown Alexandre Kriess Gregory Woods Google Scholar Terry Pinfold Gabriella Brown Alexandre Kriess Gregory Woods PubMed Terry Pinfold Gabriella Brown Alexandre Kriess Gregory Woods Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.