Ultraviolet B Irradiation of Human Leukaemia HL-60 Cells in Vitro Induces Apoptosis

Summary

UV radiation is known to be a potent agent for the induction of programmed cell death (apoptosis) in human skin. However, the mechanistic aspects of UV-induced apoptosis remain ill-defined. In this study the effects of varying periods of UV-irradiation on the human leukaemia HL-60 cell line and on five other human cell lines were investigated. HL-60 cells were found to rapidly undergo apoptosis en masse after short periods of UV-irradiation, whereas prolonged exposure of these cells to this form of radiation induced a more rapid form of cell death which was suggestive of necrosis, the pathological mode of cell death. Similar effects were observed on the U937 (myelomonocytic), Molt-4 (T-lymphoblastoid), and Molt-3 (T-lymphoblastoid) cell lines, whereas the K562 (pre-erythroid) and Daudi (B-lymphoblastoid) cell lines proved to be relatively resistant to the death-inducing properties of UV-irradiation by comparison. UV-induced apoptosis in cell lines was characterized by morphological changes as well as DNA fragmentation into unit multiples of ∼200 bp, which was indicative of endogenous endonuclease activation. This DNA fragmentation pattern was not detected in cells immediately after UV-irradiation, and was therefore not the result of direct UV-induced DNA damage. UV-induced apoptosis of the HL-60 cell line was found to require extracellular calcium and to be inhibited in a dose-dependent way by zinc added to the culture medium.