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Letters To th Editor

Supprssor Tolerance Has Implications for Cancer

Department of Microbiology John Curtin School of Medical Research Australian National University Canberra City, A.C.T. 2601 Australia

Abstract

Sir: The article by Scibienski, Harris, Fong, and Benjamini in the July issue of your Journal demonstrates suppressor tolerance in a way which is analogous to classical helper experiments: an animal tolerized to A and challenged with A-B dimer responds poorly to B. Since the tolerance was induced neonatally, there is a strong possibility that self-tolerance may operate in the same way, i.e., a foreign molecule coupled to a self antigen would invite a suppressed response. Some evidence exists for poor immunogenicity of haptens attached to self-components.

This has a number of interesting implications. Tumors are autologous cells with (sometimes) new antigens attached. The fact that they so often are poorly immunogenic may reflect a mechanism of the kind described by Scibienski et al.: suppressor cells, recognizing the self antigens, damp down the response to the tumor-specific antigens. Thus the tumor survives.