Induction of stable long-term mixed hematopoietic chimerism following nonmyeloablative conditioning with T cell-depleting antibodies, cyclophosphamide, and thymic irradiation leads to donor-specific in vitro and in vivo tolerance.

BACKGROUND: Successful transplantation of solid organs relies on long-term immunosuppression for the prevention of graft rejection. Donor-specific tolerance without the need for continuous immunosuppression can be observed after allogeneic BMT. However, its routine use for tolerance induction has been precluded so far by the high conditioning-related toxicity of standard BMT regimens. Our laboratory has recently established a cyclophosphamide (CTX) plus thymic irradiation (TI)-based nonmyeloablative conditioning protocol for the treatment of hematologic malignancies. We have recently described the successful clinical application of this approach for the induction of donor-specific tolerance in a patient receiving a living-related kidney transplant, which resulted in graft acceptance without long-term immunosuppression. The aim of this study was to evaluate the induction and maintenance of host-versus-graft tolerance following this CTX-plus-TI-based regimen in a mouse model. METHODS: Induction of mixed hematopoietic chimerism and development of donor-specific tolerance following the CTX-based nonmyeloablative conditioning regimen (200 mg/kg CTX, in vivo T-cell depletion [anti-CD4 monoclonal antibody (MoAb) GK1.5 and anti-CD8 MoAb 2.43], and 7 Gy TI) was studied in the fully major histocompatibility complex (MHC)-mismatched B10.A (H2a)-->B6 (H2b) strain combination. RESULTS: The conditioning regimen allowed allogeneic bone marrow engraftment and persistent (>30 weeks) mixed lymphohematopoietic chimerism in almost all recipients. TI was essential to allow engraftment and development of tolerance, which was evident in all lasting chimeras. Compared to animals receiving a similar TBI-based conditioning regimen, overall levels of chimerism were significantly lower in the CTX-plus-TI-conditioned animals. However, donor-specific tolerance in vitro and in vivo was evident in CTX-plus-TI-conditioned chimeras. Tolerance was associated with the presence of donor-type MHC class II+ cells in the thymus and deletion of donor-reactive cells, as determined by Mtv-8 and Mtv-9 superantigen-mediated deletion of Vbeta11+ and Vbeta5/1.2+ T cells. CONCLUSION: Engraftment, long-term chimerism, and induction of donor-specific tolerance can be achieved using a nonmyeloablative CTX-based conditioning regimen in fully MHC-mismatched BMT recipients without the induction of GVHD.

Lymphohematopoietic graft-vs.-host reactions can be induced without graft-vs.-host disease in murine mixed chimeras established with a cyclophosphamide-based nonmyeloablative conditioning regimen.

Mixed hematopoietic chimerism can be induced in mice receiving allogeneic bone marrow transplantation (BMT) after nonmyeloablative host conditioning with depletion T cells with of anti-T cell monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), low-dose (3 Gy) total-body irradiation (TBI), and local thymic irradiation (7 Gy). These mice are specifically tolerant to donor and host antigens. When nontolerant donor T cells are given to chimeras several months after BMT, full donor-type chimerism develops, but graft-vs.-host disease (GVHD) does not occur. The induction of such lymphohematopoietic GVH reactions without GVHD could provide an approach to separating graft-vs.-leukemia (GVL) from GVHD in patients with hematologic malignancies. To make the nonmyeloablative conditioning regimen described above more cytoreductive for such malignancies, we have now modified it by replacing TBI with cyclophosphamide (CP). Treatment with anti-CD4 and anti-CD8 mAbs on day -5, 200 mg/kg CP on day -1, and 7 Gy thymic irradiation on day 0 was only slightly myelosuppressive and allowed fully major histocompatibility complex (MHC)-mismatched (with or without multiple minor antigen disparities) allogeneic bone marrow to engraft and establish long-term mixed chimerism in 40 to 82% of recipients in three different strain combinations. The administration of nontolerant donor spleen cells at 5 weeks or at 5, 8, and 11 weeks posttransplant was capable of eliminating host hematopoietic cells, leading to full or nearly full donor chimerism in six of six and two of four chimeric animals in two different strain combinations. No clinical evidence of GVHD was observed in any recipients of these donor leukocyte infusions (DLI). These studies demonstrate that induction of mixed chimerism with nonmyeloablative conditioning followed at appropriate times by DLI might allow lymphohematopoietic GVH reactions, and hence GVL effects, to eliminate chronic hematologic malignancies without causing clinically significant GVHD.