SYK-targeted dendritic cell-mediated cytotoxic T lymphocytes enhance the effect of immunotherapy on retinoblastoma

PURPOSE: Retinoblastoma (RB) is the most common primary intraocular tumor in children. Chemotherapy is currently the main method of RB treatment. Unfortunately, RB often becomes chemoresistant and turns lethal. Here, we used in vitro cell immunotherapy to explore whether adoptive immunotherapy could be used as a potential treatment for RB. We focused on spleen tyrosine kinase (SYK), which is significantly upregulated in RB cells and serves as a marker for RB cells. METHODS: Using lentiviruses, we genetically modified dendritic cells (DCs) to express and present the SYK peptide antigen to cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs) in vitro. We used SYK-negative cell lines (MDA-MB-231, MCF-10A, and hTERT-RPE1) and SYK-positive cell lines (MCF-7 and RB-Y79) to evaluate the specificity and cytotoxicity of DC presented CTLs using FACS, live-cell imaging, and RNA interference. RESULTS: The cytotoxicity of CTLs induced by SYK-overexpressing DCs (SYK-DC–CTLs) was enhanced more than three times in SYK-positive cell lines compared with SYK-negative cell lines. DCs primed with SYK could drive CTL cytotoxicity against SYK-positive cell lines but not against SYK-negative cell lines. Moreover, SYK-silenced RB-Y79 cells successfully evaded the cytotoxic attack from SYK-DC–CTLs. However, SYK-DC–CTLs could target SYK overexpressed hTERT-RPE1 cells, suggesting that SYK is a specific antigen for RB. Furthermore, SYK-DC–CTL exhibited specific cytotoxicity against carboplatin-resistant RB-Y79 cells in vitro. CONCLUSIONS: Our data showed that SYK could be a potential immunotherapy target mediated by DCs. We propose SYK as a candidate target for treatment of chemoresistant RB. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s00432-018-2584-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.