Inhibitory Effects of 4T1 Breast Tumor Transplantation on Mouse Peripheral Blood Immune Cell Populations

Aims: One of serious threats to women's health is mammary cancer whose occurrence, development, and treatment are related to the body’s immunological circumstances. In addition, the cancer also imposes the some effects on the body’s immune system. However, the body’s response is very diverse because it varies from type to type of cancer. This paper reported that the effects of 4T1 cell transplantation on immune cells and spleen in mice.

Methods: Twenty female BALB/C mice were randomly divided into a control group and transplantation group. 4T1 cells were injected into the forth mammary fat pad to construct an animal model of breast cancer metastasis. The lymphocytes from mouse peripheral blood after transplantation and were analyzed by flow cytometry.

Results: The transplantation of 4T1 cells rapidly and continuously decreased the percentages of total T cells, total B cells, cytotoxic T cells and helper T cells in peripheral blood during experimental period (28 days). In addition, memory T cells in the transplantation group were increased at 28 days after transplantation. Only the natural killer (NK) cell percentage was significantly increased at 14 days after transplantation.

Conclusions: 4T1 cell transplantation exerted distinctive effects on the different types of immune cells in mouse peripheral blood: the transplantation of 4T1 cells decreased the levels of total T cells, total B cells, cytotoxic T cells, helper T cells and memory T cells, and the natural killer (NK) cell was increased transiently than in control group.