Influence of transplantable melanomas on the secretion of cytokines by hamster peritoneal macrophages.

The subject of the study was the influence of two lines of transplantable melanomas on the secretion of cytokines (IL-6, TNF-alpha, OSM) and total proteins by hamster peritoneal macrophages. The results showed a statistically significant increase of total protein content and decrease of cytokine content in the supernatants of 24 h cultured macrophages from melanoma-bearing animals in comparison with control macrophages. Changes in the secretory function were more marked in the case of macrophages from hamsters bearing amelanotic melanoma. This may suggest that the biological features of melanomas can influence peritoneal macrophages to release the particular cytokines at different levels.