Jurkat leukaemia cell line

As was the case for most other cytokines, medical appraisal/use of IL-2 was initially impractical due to the minute quantities in which it is normally produced. Some transformed cell lines, most notably the Jurkat leukaemia cell line, produces IL-2 in increased quantities, and much of the IL-2 used for initial characterization studies was obtained from this source. Large-scale IL-2 production was made possible by recombinant DNA technologies. Although the IL-2 gene/cDNA has now been expressed in a wide variety of host systems, it was initially expressed in E. coli, and most products being clinically evaluated are obtained from that source. As mentioned previously, the absence of glycosylation on the recombinant product does not alter its biological activity. 

Raubenheimer reported the anti-cancer activity of compound 34 (Figure 4.9).This complex was tested on human cervical epithelioid carcinoma cell line HeLa, human colon adenocarcinoma cell line CoLo 320 DM, leukaemia cell line Jurkat, and breast cancer cell line MCF-7. IC50 values determined by the MTT assay showed human lymphocytes were less sensitive than the cancer cells tested, indicating some selectivity for the cancer cells. 

The dimers were studied more closely in HL-60 leukaemia and Jurkat cell lines, and it was found that they have activities comparable to the clinically nsed anticancer drng doxorubicin. In terms of general toxicity to normal cells, it was observed that dimers 115 and 116 were not toxic to lymphocytes at doses approaching 100 p,M. In preliminary studies, apoptotic cell death was observed on exposnre to these componnds and further studies are ongoing to elucidate the underlying mechanism of apoptosis. For purposes of comparison, the corresponding phosphate ester monomers 117 and 118 were prepared and proved to have no antitumour activity in the cell lines examined. This result is important, because it rules out any role of the phosphate ester functionality in mediating the observed cytotoxic effects and emphasizes the necessity for a bivalent unit. 

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