Figure 5. In vivoantibody depletion experiment.
Groups of C57BL/6 mice (5 per group) were vaccinated i.p. with 1 × 106 /mouse of irradiated MOSEC tumor cells and 1 μg /mouse α-GalCer twice with a 1-wk interval. One week after the last vaccination, mice were depleted of immune cells expressing CD4, CD8 or NK1.1 markers using 200 μg /mouse of purified rat monoclonal antibodies GK1.5 (anti-CD4), mAb 2.43 (anti-CD8), or mAb PK136 (anti-NK1.1). The mice were injected with antibodies 3 times for the first week and then once every week. One group of vaccinated mice without depletion was used as a control. Two weeks after the last vaccination, the non-depleted and depleted mice were challenged i.p. with 2 × 105 /mouse of MOSEC-luc tumor cells. The growth of the tumor in mice was imaged on days 0, 14, 21 and 28 after tumor challenge using the IVIS Imaging System Series 200. Bioluminescence signals were acquired for one minute. (A) Representative images of MOSEC-luc tumor challenged mice with no depletion, CD4 depletion, CD8 depletion or NK1.1 depletion. (B) Line graph depicting the kinetic expression of luciferase in MOSEC-luc tumor challenged mice with or without depletion (mean±s.e.). (* indicates p < 0.05; ** indicates p < 0.01 as compared to the control).