739. Lentiviruses as Gene Transfer Vehicles for Cancer Gene Therapy

Lentiviral vectors are very efficient gene transfer vehicles for most cell types, regardless of the species or tissue of origin. Several reports suggest that these vectors are efficient for most human tumor cells, but their utility in cancer gene therapy has not been examined systematically. To study this, VSV-G pseudotyped HIV-1 vector and E1/E3 deleted adenoviral vector (serotype 5) were compared for their capability to transduce 42 different human cancer cell lines. In most cases MOI 3 yielded 50-90 % transduction efficiency with both vectors. In vivo studies with nude mouse s.c. tumor model (A549 lung cancer cells) revealed that lentiviruses were more efficient vehicles than adenoviruses when same amount of virus was used.