DCs treated with bortezomib show skewed phenotypic maturation in response to stimuli of bacterial (lipopolysaccharide [LPS]) and endogenous sources (including TNF-alpha and CD40L), as well as reduced cytokine production and immunostimulatory capacity.
DCs treated with sCD40L generated a greater number of antigen-specific T cells (P <.05) by tetramer and Elispot analyses, and yielded specific T cells with significant cytotoxicity against HLA-matched melanoma cell lines.