ABSTRACT
Interleukin 7 (IL-7) is a 25 kDa glycoprotein that was originally characterized as a product of a cloned murine bone marrow stromal cell line, and its mRNA has since been detected in the thymus and spleen. This chapter determines whether the administration of recombinant human IL-7 (rhlL-7) to mice could alter the incidence or total number of various lymphoid subsets and assesses the effects of IL-7 against experimental metastases in mice. The chapter demonstrates that the twice daily administration of IL-7 preferentially stimulated a splenic lymphocytosis, largely through an increase in B220+ cells. In contrast rhlL-7 has no demonstrable effects on either NK or lymphokine activated killer cells (LAK) activities in either normal or tumor-bearing mice suggesting that this mechanism may not be involved in the antimetastatic effects of rhlL-7, and demonstrating that rhlL-7 may not fully cross species since rhlL-7 induces human LAK and rmlL-7 increases mouse LAK.
