The analysis of malignancy by cell fusion: IV. hybrids between tumour cells and a malignant l cell derivative

ABSTRACT Previous experiments showed that when a range of different highly malignant mouse tumour cells were fused with L cell derivatives of low tumorigenicity, the resulting hybrid cells, so long as they retained something close to the complete chromosome sets of both parent cells, had little or no ability to grow progressively in vivo. Tumours arising from the injection of such hybrids were produced not by progressive growth of the cells injected, but by selective overgrowth of cells from which certain specific, but as yet unidentified, chromosomes had been eliminated. In the present experiments the same malignant mouse tumour cells were fused with a highly malignant L cell derivative selected from the wild type cell population by passage through the animal. In all cases the resulting hybrid cells were found to be highly malignant; and the chromosome constitutions of the tumours arising from the injection of these hybrids were not significantly different from those of the cells injected. These findings confirm the interpretation given to the previous work: the L cell derivatives of low tumorigenicity contribute to the hybrid cells some factor, linked to specific chromosomes, that suppresses the malignant character of the tumour cell, and this suppression is removed, with consequent reappearance of the malignant phenotype, when certain chromosomes are eliminated.