Carcinogenesis Advance Access originally published online on February 14, 2007
Carcinogenesis 2007 28(7):1613-1620; doi:10.1093/carcin/bgm031
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Cellular vitamin C increases chromate toxicity via a death program requiring mismatch repair but not p53
Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Brown University, 70 Ship Street, Room 507, Providence, RI 02912, USA
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. Tel: +401 863 2912; Fax: +401 863 9008; Email: anatoly_zhitkovich{at}brown.edu
Ascorbate (Asc) plays a key role in reductive activation of carcinogenic chromium(VI) in vivo. In addition to much higher rates (t1/2 = 1 min for 1 mM Asc), its reactions at physiological conditions differ from other reducers by low yields of Cr(V) intermediates. Human cells in culture are severely Asc deficient, which results in distorted metabolism and potentially abnormal responses to Cr(VI). We found that restoration of physiological Asc levels in human lung cells (primary IMR90 fibroblasts and epithelial H460 cells) increased clonogenic lethality and apoptosis by Cr(VI). Enhanced cytotoxicity in mass cultures was more evident after normalization for lower Cr uptake caused by leakage of Asc into media. Asc did not change uptake-adjusted yields of CrDNA adducts and had no effect on cytotoxicity when delivered shortly after Cr(VI) exposure. Protein and Ser-15 phosphorylation levels of p53 did not show any association with the presence of Asc and there were no increases in p53-driven reporter activity in Cr-treated cells. Stable silencing of p53 expression by short hairpin RNA (shRNA) had no effect on toxicity of Cr(VI) in both Asc and +Asc IMR90 and H460 cells. In contrast, shRNA-mediated depletion of essential components of MutS or MutL mismatch repair complexes greatly improved survival of all Cr-treated cells and eliminated Asc-potentiated effects on cell death. Thus, mismatch repair-mediated enhancement of Cr(VI) cytotoxicity by Asc should promote the selection of MSI+/wt-p53 phenotype found among chromate-induced human lung cancers. Our findings also indicate that Asc plays a dual role in Cr(VI) toxicity: protective outside and potentiating inside the cell.
Abbreviations: Asc, ascorbate; DHA, dehydroascorbic acid; PBS, phosphate-buffered saline; SDS, sodium dodecyl sulfate; shRNA, short hairpin RNA
Received December 12, 2006; revised January 25, 2007; accepted February 3, 2007.