Neuroblastoma is one of the most common solid neoplasm in childhood, which still has relatively poor prognosis despite advanced therapeutic modalities. It is characterized by the potential to differentiate into more mature, ganglion cell-like
phenotype
in the presence of certain agents such asγ-interferon and retinoic acid, and there have been some reports as to the changes of the cell surface adhesion molecule expression during the differentiation of neuroblastoma cells, induced by these
agents.
The cell surface adhesion molecules seem to be potential adjuncts in the treatment of tumors by immune modulators such as NK or LAK, and we performed a chronological observation of the changes of various cell surface adhesion molecule(NCAM, ICAM,
LFA-1,
LFA-3, HLA-ABC, HLA-DR) expression in three neuroblastoma cell lines(IMR-32, SK-N-MC, SK-N-SH) having different characteristics during the differentiation induced byγ-interferon and retinoic acid, along with chromosomal findings and N-myc
expression.
There was no chronological changes of cytogenetic features in all cell lines during differentiation process and N-myc amplification was present in IMR-32 only. The expression of surface adhesion molecules ICAM and HLA-ABC increased as the cells
differentiate into more mature phenotype in all cell lines under the influence ofγ-interferon or retinoic acid. The general patterns of cell surface adhesion molecules had minor differences.
Above results implicate that theγ-interferon and retinoic acid, by inducing changes of cell surface adhesion molecule expression, may be potential adjuncts in the immunotherapy of neuroblastoma using NK or LAK cells.
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