Abstract.The most frequent interventions in cancer therapy are currently the destruction of cells by irradiation or administration of drugs both able to induce radical formation and toxic metabolites by enzyme-catalyzed reactions. The aim of this study was to determine the cell viability of cells undergoing a DNA damage threshold accomplished by ROS overproduction via both ectopic expression of murine spermine oxidase (mSMOX) and bovine serum amine oxidase (BSAO) enzymes. Low dose of X-irradiation delivers a challenging dose of damage as evaluated in proficient Chinese hamster AA8 cell line and both deficient transcription-coupled nucleotide excision repair (NER) UV61 cells and deficient base excision repair (BER) EM9 cells, at 6 and 24 h after exposure. The priming dose of ROS overexposure by mSMOX provokes an adaptive response in N18TG2, AA8 and EM9 cell lines at 24 h. Interestingly, in the UV61 cells, ROS overexposure by mSMOX delivers an earlier adaptive response to radiation. The enzymatic formation of toxic metabolites has mainly been investigated on wild-type (WT) and multidrug-resistant (MDR) cancer cell lines, using and spermine as substrate of the BSAO enzyme. MDR cells are more sensitive to the toxic polyamine metabolites than WT cells, thus indicating a new therapeutic strategy to overcome MDR tumors. Since SMOX in mammals is differentially activated in a tissue-specific manner and cancer cells can differ in terms of DNA repair and MDR capabilities, it could be of interest to simultaneously treat with very low dose of X-rays and/or to alter SMOX metabolism to generate a differential response in healthy and cancer tissues.
IntroductionMammalian cells evolved and constantly live in a highly reactive oxidative environment. In the mammalian organism H 2 O 2 has a central position within the reactive oxygen species (ROS) family. Its formation by several reactions and its controlled inactivation is the basis of redox homeostasis (1,2), since free radicals are highly cytotoxic. Oxidative stress is the result of interactions with macromolecules among highly reactive hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2 ) and singlet oxygen ( ). Besides the major interest in identification and advancement of compounds which are either radical scavengers or antioxidants, ROS can alternate between a positive and negative cellular outcomes (3). Insufficient ROS defense mechanisms are mutagenic and promote cell death, apoptosis and autophagy (4). Recently autophagy and apoptosis stimulus by the presence of an H 2 O 2 -induced pathway in human primary and tumor cell lines and in primary cells (5)