UDP-Gal: βGlcNAc β1, 3-galactosyltransferase, polypeptide 3 (GALT3) is a tumour antigen recognised by HLA-A2-restricted cytotoxic T lymphocytes from patients with brain tumour

Patient prognosis in the case of malignant brain tumours is generally poor, despite significant improvements in the early detection of the tumours, and thus the development of new treatment modalities is needed. One of the most prominent modalities is specific immunotherapy, for which the elucidation of antigenic molecules of malignant brain tumours recognized by T cells is essential. We report here a gene, UDP-Gal: βGlcNAc β1, 3-galactosyltransferase, polypeptide 3, encoding three epitope peptides recognised by tumor-reactive cytotoxic T lymphocytes in an HLA-A2-restricted manner. Two of the three peptides possessed an ability to induce HLA-A2-restricted and tumour-reactive cytotoxic T lymphocytes from peripheral blood mononuclear cells of patients with brain tumours. These peptides may be useful in the peptide-based specific immunotherapy for patients with malignant brain tumours. British Journal of Cancer (2002) 87, 1006–1012. doi:10.1038/sj.bjc.6600593 www.bjcancer.com © 2002 Cancer Research UK