Fig. 3.

DC-induced expansion of tumor-reactive T cells and DTH skin testing in patients with concomitant gemcitabine therapy. a Proliferative capacity of T cells stimulated with tumor lysate-loaded DC was compared to T cells stimulated with unloaded DC. The four graphs represent T cells derived from a representative patient (47) prior to, as well as 16, 27, and 52 weeks after, the start of DC vaccination. The clinical course of the disease is noted in the figure headlines. Y-axis depicts increase in non-adherent cell proliferation induced by lysate-loaded versus -unloaded DC relative to proliferation of unstimulated NAC, expressed as index over baseline. b Tumor lysate was injected subcutaneously into the forearm. Forty-eight hours after injection, patients were examined for the presence of a skin induration. Whereas no skin induration was found initially, a reddish and indurated skin reaction appeared after the three initial DC vaccinations. Skin reactivity increased over time. c T cells derived at weeks 0, 19, and 52 after start of therapy were stimulated with unloaded versus lysate-loaded DC. The number of IFN-γ-producing T cells was quantified in an ELISPOT assay. Error bars indicate SEM, asterisks indicate P ≤ 0.05 in Student’s t test