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Hybridomas secreting monoclonal antibodies with specificity for Hooded rat fibrosarcomata have been obtained by fusion of the rat myeloma Y3 Ag 1.2.3. (Galfre, Milstein & Wright, 1979) with cells taken from spleens or lymph nodes of immunized syngeneic and allogeneic donors. Two of the monoclonal antibodies, both derived from he spleens of tumour bearers, showed specificity for individual tumours one for MC24 (M10/76) and the other for HSNTC (11/160). These two antibodies had a long half-life in the blood when injected intravenously showing that they had a low affinity for normal tissue antigens. Monoclonal antibodies exhibiting broad tumour specificity or extensive cross-reactivity with normal cells were secreted by many of the hybridomas derived from both syngeneic and allogeneic rats that had been hyperimmunized with tumour cells. These results are discussed in relation to the production of monoclonal anti-tumour antibodies for use in experimental therapy.

Hooded Lister/Cbi rats bearing the HSN.TC fibrosarcoma produced a high-titre non-complement-binding IgG antibody, and tests in vitro indicated that the syngeneic antibody was specific for this tumour. About 1.4 X 10(5) antibody molecules were bound per cell, a figure one eighth that for cells treated with a high-titre allo-antiserum. When tumour-bearer serum was passively transferred into congenitally athymic rats bearing the HSN.TC tumour the antibody was absorbed out specifically, by comparison with control animals or athymic rats bearing an unrelated tumour that was also syngeneic in Hooded rats. The kinetics of loss of antibody from the surface of HSN.TC cells has been monitored in vitro and the antibody has been found to have an extended half-life at the cell surface (greater than 40 h).

The IgG2b monoclonal antibody M10/76, which is specific for the Hooded rat fibrosarcoma MC24, was obtained by fusion of the rat myeloma Y3 Ag 1.2.3 with spleen cells from an MC24 tumour-bearing rat. This antibody has been found to inhibit lung colonization when MC24 cells were injected i.v. into Hooded rats, and when passively transferred into athymic MC24 tumour bearers, it prevented or considerably reduced the incidence of spontaneous lung metastases in more than half the treated animals.