Apoptosis Essay

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INTRODUCTION: Apoptosis is a distinct form of a programmed cell death ( PCD) and defect in apoptosis are now thought to contribute to the development and progression of cancer. Regarding the keen interest in programmed cell death in the last years, more and more assays and commercial kits are emerging to prove apoptosis. However, their detectability and reliability have been often discussed. Here we introduce rapid and simple method for evaluating apoptosis in cancer researches and genotoxicities. METHODS: NIH-3T3 cell line were used in this study, after treatment with apoptotic agent, DNA was extracted by simple protocol. Then DNA ladder and flow cytometry assays were done for detection of apoptosis in NIH-3T3 cell line. RESULT: Primary and late apoptosis in the treated cells was determined by flow cytometry analysis. Accordingly DNA ladder assay using 1.5 % gel electrophoresis showed fragmentation in the DNA of treated cells. CONCLUSSION: This research provides a fast, simple and cost-effective method in observing apoptosis in mammalian cells and could be use in cancer research and genotoxicity.
Introduction
Apoptosis is a distinct form of a programmed cell death ( PCD) or cell suicide , first described by Kerr et. al. in the 1970s(1, 2). It is a normal physiological phenomenon that plays an important role in embryonic development, maintenance of tissue homeostasis and pathology(3) . Apoptosis triggered by exogenous and endogenous stimuli as radiation, oxidative stress and genotoxic chemicals. It is defined by characteristic changes in the nuclear morphology including chromatin condensation and fragmentation , overall cell shrinkage and formation of apoptotic cell bodies. Among the many markers of apoptosis, DNA fragmentation is...

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...spite benefits of the technique , that protocol cannot be used for other purposes such as PCR , because of presence of high amount of DMSO (7).DNA ladder assay is an easily available method and seems to be very useful for quick screening of apoptotic changes in cell populations. This method allows working with cell lysates and does not require any special laboratory equipment(10).The present study results showed that this DNA ladder assay used here, is a useful method for evaluating DNA damage and fragmentation caused by apoptotic agents , drugs , food additives and etc.
Conclusion
Although flow cytometry is a quantitative technique for determining apoptosis, we believe that this simple and rapid DNA ladder Assay will be very useful for numerous labs that routinely study cell death or carry out routine experimental/clinical screening of drugs and chemotherapeutics.

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