Immunological protection induced by bacillus Calmette-Guérin treatment in a murine bladder tumor model

Immunoprotection against murine bladder carcinoma by octaarginine-modified liposomes incorporating cell wall of Mycobacterium bovis bacillus Calmette-Guérin

OBJECTIVE

To develop a prototype of a non-live bacterial agent that consists of a cell wall (CW) preparation from heat-killed bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG-CW) incorporated into octaarginine-modified cationized liposomes as a vector (R8-liposome-BCG-CW), and to evaluate its immunoprotective potentiation in mice, as although BCG is an established effective immunotherapy for nonmuscle-invasive bladder cancer, more active and less toxic treatments are needed.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The cellular interaction of R8-liposome-BCG-CW co-cultured with mouse bladder cancer cell line (MBT-2) was examined by confocal laser scanning microscopy. MBT-2 cells (7 x 10(5)) were subcutaneously inoculated with 1 mg BCG, 0.1 mg or 1 mg BCG-CW, 0.1 mg or 1 mg R8-liposome-BCG-CW in female C3H/HeN mice. The MBT-2 cells pretreated with BCG or R8-liposome-BCG-CW were re-challenged at 6 weeks. The sizes of the primary and re-challenged tumours were evaluated at 4 and 10 weeks, respectively.

RESULTS

Confocal laser scanning microscopy showed the enhanced incorporation of R8-liposome-BCG-CW into MBT-2 cells after 1 h of co-incubation. 0.1 mg R8-liposome-BCG-CW completely inhibited the growth of MBT-2 tumours while 0.1 mg BCG-CW alone did not (P = 0.002). Mice vaccinated with a mixture of MBT-2 cells and R8-liposome-BCG-CW inhibited the growth of re-challenged tumour of MBT-2 cells pretreated with BCG or R8-liposome-BCG-CW but did not inhibit that of MBT-2 cells with no pretreatment at 10 weeks, with mean (sd) tumours sizes of 54 (60) mm(2) (P < 0.001) or 69 (43) mm(2) (P = 0.003) compared with 309 (125) mm(2), respectively.

CONCLUSION

The immunotherapeutic potential of BCG-CW was enhanced by improving cellular association using the R8-liposomes delivery system. Development of this non-live bacterial agent may contribute to providing a more active and less toxic tool as a substitute for live BCG as immunotherapy against nonmuscle-invasive bladder cancer in the future.

New packaging method of mycobacterial cell wall using octaarginine-modified liposomes: enhanced uptake by and immunostimulatory activity of dendritic cells

Despite the potential of mycobacterial cell wall (CW) components to serve as immunotherapeutic agents, this application is hampered by the molecules' unfavorable physicochemical properties, such as its high molecular weight, poor solubility and negatively charged nature. Here we describe a new mycobacterial CW delivery system that uses an efficient and simple packaging method. This is achieved by incorporating mycobacterial CW into liposomes and attaching arginine octamers (R8) to the liposome surface. R8-modified liposomes improve the uptake of mycobacterial CW by dendritic cells (DC) and enhance its immunostimulatory activity. High R8 surface density promoted high levels of mycobacterial CW uptake by DC compared to low density R8-modified liposomes. Maturation markers (CD80, CD86, MHC Class II molecules) showed significantly enhanced expression on DC pulsed with high density R8-modified liposomes containing mycobacterial CW. Moreover, R8-modified liposomes with mycobacterial CW incorporated induced production of IL-12 p40 by DC, at levels similar to those produced by lipopolysaccharide-pulsed DC. We assert that R8-modified liposomes with mycobacterial CW incorporated should have tremendous potential as immune-potentiating agents.