Objective: To investigate the anti-tumor immunity in vitro of heat shock protein 70-peptide complexes (HSP70-PC) from human lung cancer tissue. Methods: HSP70-PC was purified from lung tumor tissues and corresponding non-tumor lung samples with the methods of ADP-affinity chromatography, DEAE ion-exchange chromatography and Western-blot. The activation and proliferation of PBMC induced by different HSP70-PC and tumor cytotoxic reactivity to A549 cells in vitro were measured by the MTT cell proliferation assay. Results: The purified HSP70-PC had a very high purity found by SDS-PAGE and Western-blot. Human lymphocytes were sensitized efficiently by HSP70 preparation purified from lung cancer tissues and a definite cytotoxicity to A-549 cells was observed. There was significant difference with HSP70-PC purified from lung cancer, compared with the control group (P<0.001). Conclusion: High purity of HSP70-PC could be achieved from tumor tissues in this study. HSP70-PC purified from human tumor tissues can induce anti-tumor immunity in vitro mainly implemented by eliciting CTL immunity.
