Morphological and spectroscopic study of human neuroblastoma IMR-32 cell differentiation.

Abstract

All-trans retinoic acid (tRA) and 8-bromo-adenosine-3 ':5'-cyclic monophosphate (cAMP) have been shown to inhibit proliferation, induce cell differentiation and reverse malignant phenotype of a variety of neuroblastoma cell types in vitro. In this thesis, we chose IMR-32 human neuroblastoma cell line because it exhibits two of the main defects found in neuroblastoma: N-myc gene amplification and defective high affinity NGF receptor Trk-A. Treated IMR-32 cells were analyzed for alterations in cell growth and cell morphology. In the course of the study we also investigated the effect of the two differentiation inducers on the expression and distribution of neurofilament (NF) proteins in the IMR-32 cell line. Diagnosis of various other cancers by studying the structural changes at the molecular level using Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) is well established. The main objective of this thesis work was to determine whether diagnostic bands in FTIR spectrum reflect the mitotic ability of IMR-32 cells and whether treatment with tRA and cAMP induces spectral changes characteristic of normal cells. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)