A better cell line for making hybridomas secreting specific antibodies

The identification of such a cell line, Sp2/0-Ag14, is reported here the identification of a tumour cell fusion partner that makes no Ig but which can nevertheless be fused with spleen cells to obtain hybrids secreting only the specific antibody.

Abstract

FUSION of myeloma cells which grow in tissue culture with spleen cells from an immunised mouse provides a general method for obtaining cell lines (hybridomas) which make antibody of the desired specificity1–3. Hybrids derived from these myelomas make the immunoglobulin (Ig) heavy and light chains of the myeloma parent as well as the antigen-specific heavy and light chains of the spleen cell parent. In conditions in which the two heavy and two light chains associate randomly, a hybridoma would make 10 distinct Ig molecules, and the specific antibody would comprise only 1/16 of the total Ig4,5. To obtain hybridomas making only the specific antibodies requires a tumour cell fusion partner that itself makes no Ig but which can nevertheless be fused with spleen cells to obtain hybrids secreting only the specific antibody. We report here the identification of such a cell line, Sp2/0-Ag14.