Method for producing human antibodies in SCID mice which uses dendritic cells pulsed with antigen-antibody complexes and antigen-antibody complexes as immunizing agents

1. A method for producing human IgG antibodies in a severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) mouse which has been transplanted with human immune cells, which comprises

injecting human peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL) into a SCID mouse to produce a SCIDhu PBL mouse that contains human B cells that produces antibodies specific for an antigen with which the SCIDhu PBL mouse is immunized;

immunizing the SCIDhu PBL mouse with antibody-antigen complex; and

immunizing the SCIDhu PBL mouse with human dendritic cells which have been contacted (pulsed) in vitro with the antigen-antibody complex.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the dendritic cells comprise autologous peripheral blood dendritic cells.

3. The method of claim 1 , which includes Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) transformation during the immunization step.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein said SCIDhu PBL mouse is immunized with antigen-antibody complex prior to immunization with dendritic cells which have been contacted (pulsed) with antigen-antibody complex.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein a first immunization with antigen-antibody complex is followed by a second immunization with human dendritic cells which have been contacted (pulsed) with antigen-antibody complex that is effected about 1 to 15 days after the fist immunization.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein said second immunization is effected about 7 days after the first immunization.

7. The method of claim 4 , which further includes at least one additional immunization (“boosting”) wherein the SCIDhu PBL mouse is administered antigen or antigen-antibody complex.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein a boosting step is effected about a week after the first immunization.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein another boosting step is effected about two weeks after the first immunization.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein another boosting step is effected about three weeks after the first immunization.

11. The method of claim 1 which results in human IgG antibody titers in the serum of the SCIDhu PBL mouse ranging from about 0.56 to about 2.19 mg/ml.

12. The method of claim 1 , wherein the dendritic cells are generated from peripheral blood mononuclear cell-derived progenitor cells.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the dendritic cells are generated by inducing the differentiation of peripheral blood mononuclear cell-derived progenitor cells into dendritic cells in vitro.

14. The method of claim 1 , wherein the antibody of the antigen-antibody complex is a murine IgG antibody that comprises an Fc portion that binds to an Fc receptor of a human dendritic cell.

15. The method of claim 14 , wherein the antibody of the antigen-antibody complex is a murine IgG 2a antibody.

16. The method of claim 1 , wherein the antigen of the antigen-antibody complex is a human tumor-associated antigen.

17. The method of claim 16 , wherein the antigen is p185 (HER/neu) and the antibody is an anti-p185 antibody.