Prolonged survival in long-passage AKR leukemia using chemotherapy, radiotherapy, and adoptive immunotherapy.

Despite recent advances in the treatment of acute leu kemia in man (13, 14, 16, 19), most patients die of recurrent leukemia (10). Chemotherapy usually is much less effective when used following relapse of leukemia after an initial remission and, with only occasional exceptions, sustained subsequent remissions do not occur (1). The experiments described below were performed in order to test a strategy that might have therapeutic applicability for the leukemic patient in whom conventional therapy has failed. In brief, AKR mice bearing advanced acute lymphocytic leukemia were treated with a combination of chemotherapy, irradiation therapy, and adoptive immunotherapy using a transplant of bone marrow and lymph node cells from