Radiation-Induced Apoptosis in Breast Cancer Cells
Abstract
This project is designed to investigate the role of apoptosis in irradiated and tamoxifen- treated breast cancer cells and to study the potential for using these manipulations to enhance tumor cell killing, thus improving radiotherapy of breast cancer. Several new observations have been made this year. First, there appears to be a lack of apoptotic-like DNA fragmentation to oligonucleosomal sized pieces in four breast cancer cell lines exposed to radiation and/or estrogen, progesterone, or tamoxifen. However, pulsed field gel electrophoresis studies suggest apoptosis is occurring in these cells, so studies using other assays for apoptosis are being initiated. A second important observation is that ER+ cell lines may be more radiation sensitive than ER- cells. This observation must be further studied by evaluating clonogenic radiation survival curves in additional cell lines of both types. The third important observation is that tamoxifen treatment of ER+ cell lines appears to increase the radiation sensitivity of those cells.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 01, 1997
- Accession Number
- ADA339099
Entities
People
- Kathryn D Held
Organizations
- Massachusetts General Hospital