Chemotherapy in intracerebrally transplanted tumors induced with transplacental administration of ethylnitrosourea in rats.

Four tumors of the spinal cord were induced with ethylnitrosourea in rats by transplacental administration and transplanted into the brains of animals of the same strain. One of these intracerebrally grafted tumor lines (G-XIII) was followed up over the first 10 passages and treated with CCNU and other alkylating drugs. The results were compared with findings in an earlier established line (G-XII) in passage 12 and 59, which in the first instance was sensitive to CCNU. The CCNU application prolonged survival in treated animals in various treatment schedules in the first 10 intracerebrally grafted generations of the tumor up to 59%. Induction times of tumors became increasingly shorter. The susceptibility of early passages was similar in both lines. Its loss in late passages went together with diffuse growth of the tumor and reticulin fiber production. In addition, glial fibrillary acid protein expression and formation of intermediate filaments in perivascular tumor cells was lost.