ABSTRACT
Objective: This study aimed to compare and analyze the functional differences between peripheral blood mono-cyte-derived dendritic cells (DCs) of Helicobacter pylori-positive and H. pylori-negative patients with gastric cancer. Methods:H. py-lori infection was detected in 84 patients with gastric cancer in our hospital from January 2011 to October 2012 by the 14C-urea breath test. DCs were generated from monocytes isolated by an adherent method from the two groups of patients and cultured in the presence of rhIL-4, rhGM-CSF, and rhTNF-α. Furthermore, the expression of surface marker molecules was determined by fluorescence-activat-ed cell sorting analysis. The cytotoxicity of DCs pulsed T cells against gastric carcinoma cell was assessed by the lactate dehydroge-nase-releasing assay. The secretion of IL-12 and IFN-γin the supernatant was determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Re-sults:No difference was observed in the morphological change of the maturation process. The mean expression of CD1a, CD80, CD83, CD86, and HLA-DR molecules in DCs of H. pylori-infected patients was higher than that in DCs of H. pylori-negative group, and the differences were statistically significant except for CD1a and HLA-DR. The cytotoxicity activities, IL-12 release, and IFN-γrelease in the H. pylori-positive group were significantly higher than those in the H. pylori-negative group (P<0.05). Conclusion:H. pylori infec-tion has no effect on the morphological change of the maturation process of monocyte-derived DCs. These data clearly demonstrate that monocyte-derived DCs of H. pylori-infected patients with gastric cancer can induce stronger maturation and activation than those of H. pylori-negative patients.