Wood, Vol 84, No 10 (November 15). 1994: pp 3457-3464
Abstract
Leukemic B cells from a majority of patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) enter the cell cycle upon stimu- lation in vitro with loxoribine, a potent 7,8-disubstituted guanine ribonucleoside immunostimulant. In the absence of added costimulants, a proportion of these cells become acti- vated and undergo DNA synthesis and mitosis accompanied by a marked increase in expression of an array of cell surface activation antigens. The resultant activated B-CLL cells ex- hibit greatly enhanced sensitivity to cycle-active cytotoxic drugs. This approach may be of potential value in the ther- apy of CLL.