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Basic Science Investigations |
1 Department of Radiology, Keio University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan
2 Department of Radiology, University of Massachusetts Medical School, Worcester, Massachusetts
| ABSTRACT |
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Key Words: 99mTc antisense targeting P-glycoprotein
| INTRODUCTION |
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Three Pgp-expressing cell lines, KB-31, KB-G2, and TCO-1, were used in this investigation. KB-G2 was transfected from its parent human oral epidermoid carcinoma cell line, KB-31, and has been reported to overexpress the target mdr1 mRNA (8). TCO-1, an anaplastic thyroid carcinoma cell line established from a chemotherapy-resistant cancer, was also reported by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) to express mdr1 mRNA (9). KB-31 was used as a limited expression control cell line (10) but with caution, since MDR may easily and inadvertently be acquired. A recent measurement of relative levels of Pgp expression by RT-PCR of these 3 cell lines provided estimates for copies of the targeted mdr1 mRNA per microgram of total RNA of 103.56 (KB-31), 106.78 (KB-G2), and 105.53 (TCO-1) (Kumi Nagao, written communication, March 2003). The DNAs used were 20-mer uniformly modified phosphorothioates. The base sequence of the antisense DNA was selected to be against the mdr1 mRNA and had been shown elsewhere to inhibit Pgp in MDR 3T3 cells when incubated at a 100 nmol/L concentration (11). It was used along with its sense control DNA. The DNAs were obtained with a primary amine via a linker on the 5' end for conjugation with S-acetyl N-hydroxysuccinimide-mercaptoacetyltriglycine (S-acetyl NHS-MAG3) for radiolabeling with 99mTc (1). The DNA was also obtained native (i.e., without linker and amine/amide/MAG3) for use in the 99mTc-sestamibi studies to measure the relative MDR status of the cell lines.
The first objective of this investigation was to confirm that the cell lines showed differing levels of Pgp expression by using 99mTc-sestamibi accumulation. This radiopharmaceutical has been shown to be a substrate of Pgp (12). The second objective was to measure accumulations of the 99mTc-labeled antisense and sense control DNAs in the cell lines at different DNA concentrations in the medium. We hoped to demonstrate a statistically significant antisense differential (i.e., cellular accumulations of antisense DNA minus cellular accumulation of sense DNA) at low concentrations and to demonstrate that this differential can be reduced to insignificance by increasing the DNA concentrations to saturating levels. Achievement of both objectives would provide further evidence of an antisense effect in tissue culture and might suggest that the mdr1 mRNA may be a useful target for antisense imaging of MDR+ cancer.
| MATERIALS AND METHODS |
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DNA Conjugation and Radiolabeling
Both DNAs were conjugated with S-acetyl NHS-MAG3 via the 5' derivatized amine as previously described (14). A solution of 1 mg of DNA in 200 µL of a 0.2 mol/L concentration of N-(2-hydroxyethyl)piperazine-N'-(2-ethanesulfonic acid) buffer, pH 8.0, was added to a vial containing 1.72.0 mg of S-acetyl NHS-MAG3. The vial was immediately stirred with a vortex mixer and incubated for 1 h at room temperature. The DNA was then purified on a 0.7 x 20 cm P4 column with either a 0.25 mol/L concentration of NH4OAc buffer, pH 5.2, or a 0.05 mol/L concentration of phosphate-buffered saline (PBS), pH 7.2, as eluent. The peak fractions were pooled, and the DNA concentration was quantitated by ultraviolet absorbance at 265 nm.
DNA was radiolabeled by introducing about 37 MBq (2040 µL) of 99mTc-pertechnetate generator eluate into a combined solution consisting of 50 µL (about 10 µg) of MAG3-conjugated DNA in either the NH4OAc buffer or PBS, 25 µL of Na2tartrate·2H2O, 50 µg/µL, in a pH 9.2 buffer, and 5 µL of fresh SnCl2·2H2O, 4 µg/µL, in a 10 mmol/L concentration and HCl. The final pH was about 7.8. After stirring with a vortex mixer and then heating for 20 min in boiling water, the labeling was confirmed by C18 SepPak (Waters), in which the first elution with PBS removes radiolabeled pertechnetate and tartrate and the second elution with 40% acetonitrile removes radiolabeled DNA and the SepPak-retains radiolabeled colloids. In most cases, the radiochemical purity exceeded 90% without purification. Each preparation was terminally filtered (0.22 µm) to ensure sterility.
Sestamibi Cellular Accumulation Studies
The cells were seeded at 5 x 105 cells per well in 6-well plates at 2 mL per well and incubated at 37°C in 5% carbon dioxide for 24 h for adherence and growth. The cells were then rinsed twice with PBS. For the sestamibi studies, either antisense or sense DNA without the primary amine attached was added in triplicate to each well at a concentration of up to 500 nmol/L in OptiMEM medium (Gibco BRL Products). Control wells did not receive DNA. The plates were incubated overnight, the supernatant was removed, and 2 mL of Dulbeccos modified Eagle medium containing 2% fetal bovine serum (FBS) was added before the cells were incubated for a further 24 h. Thereafter, the medium was replaced with Dulbeccos modified Eagle medium containing 10% fetal calf serum. To each well was added 10 µL of sestamibi (148 kBq 99mTc), and the well plates were incubated at 37°C overnight. The medium was then removed, and 100-µL aliquots of each were saved for counting. Each well was then rinsed twice with PBS, and 2 mL of Bio-Rad A solution (BioRad) was added to each well for cell lysis. An aliquot of the lysate was removed for counting in an automatic NaI (Tl) well counter. After counting, the protein concentration of the cell suspension was determined by adding BioRad B, and counts were corrected for cell number.
DNA Cellular Accumulation Studies
Cells were cultured and seeded at 0.5 x 105 cells per well in 24-well plates. The 99mTc-labeled antisense and sense DNAs were diluted in OptiMEM medium to the desired concentrations in the range 251,400 nmol/L. One-half milliliter was added to each well in quadruplet, and the cells were incubated for 20 h at 37°C in 5% carbon dioxide. The cells were harvested, and aliquots of the medium and cell lysate were collected. The percentage of radioactivity that was cell associated was measured against a standard of the added radioactivity. As a further control, wells without cells were treated identically to correct for radioactivity retained on the plate during rinsing and recovered in the lysis solution. This radioactivity was found to be negligible in all cases. After counting, the protein concentration of the cell suspension was determined as before. Cell-associated radioactivity, corrected for cell number, was then plotted against DNA concentration.
| RESULTS |
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Calculations based on the cellular radioactivity added to a well combined with the known number of cells and the specific accumulation (i.e., antisense DNA accumulation minus sense DNA accumulation) show that about 107 antisense DNA accumulated specifically in each cell line over the 20-h incubation period. Our laboratories have frequently observed specific accumulations of similar magnitude in cell culture for antisense DNAs against different mRNA targets and in different cell lines (5). These values are much higher than expected on the basis on estimates of steady-state mRNA concentrations and require that the concentration of antisense DNA increase over the incubation period from nanomolar in the medium to millimolar in the cellular cytoplasma phenomenon requiring some mechanism of selective retention (2).
| DISCUSSION |
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Pgp is a transmembrane protein and the product of mdr1 mRNA translation, which, in turn, is the product of mdr1 gene expression. Pgp participates in one mechanism of MDR and has been shown responsible for cellular clearance of sestamibi (12). Therefore, a second objective of this investigation was to explore whether a radiolabeled antisense DNA against the mdr1 mRNA might accumulate in cells in rough proportion to the extent of Pgp expression. If so, it may be possible to develop an approach for hot-spot nuclear medicine imaging of increased Pgp expression, in contrast to sestamibi imaging, in which upregulation of Pgp would be expected to decrease accumulation of sestamibi.
The control cell line of this investigation was KB-31 as a "normal" expresser of Pgp (i.e., Pgp+). Our KB-31 cell line and other human oral epidermoid carcinoma cell lines also designated KB-31 have been shown to express the mdr1 mRNA at low levels and therefore may be expected to express Pgp at low levels as well (10). The study cell lines were KB-G2, a transfectant of KB-31 expected to overexpress Pgp (i.e., Pgp++), and TCO-1, also expected to be Pgp++. The result of RT-PCR performed elsewhere and described here tends to confirm these relative expression levels.
Use of sestamibi accumulation as a measure of Pgp expression made it possible to show a difference among the 3 cell lines in the degree to which the antisense DNA interfered with Pgp expression (Fig. 1). Incubation with antisense DNA had no obvious influence on sestamibi accumulation in KB-31 cells, probably because they are low in Pgp expression. That was not the case for KB-G2 and TCO-1 cells, in which incubation with antisense DNA at sufficient concentration significantly increased sestamibi accumulation. These results suggest an antisense mechanism in that a reduction in sestamibi clearance would not be expected should a control sense DNA be used in place of the antisense DNA, or should the concentration of the antisense DNA be too low, or should a particular cell line not express Pgp at sufficient levels to show an effect.
These results may be used to estimate the number of mRNA targets per tumor cell by assuming that the influence of antisense DNA on sestamibi accumulation disappears on target mRNA saturation. Because 1 g of tumor occupies a volume of about 1 mL (i.e., density of 1) then 109 cells per gram of tumor translate into 1012 L per cell. From the results presented in Figure 1 and assuming an intracellular concentration equal to the medium concentration, saturation at about 1,000 nmol/L is the equivalent of about 107 DNA per cell, or a value roughly equal to that calculated below from the results of incubation with radiolabeled DNA.
Figure 2 presents the accumulation in the 3 cell lines of radiolabeled antisense and sense DNA added at concentrations between 25 nmol/L (i.e., 150 ng/mL) and 1,400 nmol/L (i.e., 8.2 µg/mL) in the case of KB-G2 cells. The figure shows that an antisense differential (i.e., significantly higher accumulation of antisense DNA than of sense control DNA) was observed in all 3 cell lines when the DNA concentration was sufficiently low. Therefore, the mdr1 mRNA target in both KB cell types may be added to the growing list of mRNA targets and cell types for which an antisense differential has been observed in culture (15). That the effect is specific, as expected for antisense targeting, is shown by the decreasing antisense differential with increasing DNA concentration. For each cell line, the DNA concentration has been increased to the point at which the accumulation no longer shows a significant antisense differential. This behavior is therefore consistent with a specific accumulation in which the antisense DNA concentration has been increased beyond the point of target mRNA saturation, such that accumulations at higher concentrations are nonspecific. The concentration at which this occurred differed among cell types but was highest in KB-G2 cells, as was expected because this cell line was shown by RT-PCR to express the highest concentration of the target mRNA. This behavior therefore provides further evidence of an antisense mechanism of accumulation.
The high, 50%, accumulation for the antisense DNA in KB-G2 cells was a surprise. Accumulations on this order are not generally seen even when DNA is added with carriers such as cationic peptide or liposome (4). Because of the high accumulation, the number of antisense DNA that specifically accumulated (i.e., antisense DNA minus sense DNA) is calculated at about 107 per cell after 20 h of incubation. This value is higher by about one order of magnitude than that reported previously for different targets (2) and requires that the antisense DNA be concentrated from nanomolar concentrations in the medium to millimolar concentrations in the cell.
The differences in antisense DNA accumulation between the control KB-31 cells and the study cells may be less than expected on the basis of the steady-state mdr1 mRNA levels measured elsewhere by RT-PCR and reported here. One possible explanation is that the antisense DNA accumulation is only partly determined by steady-state target mRNA levels and may be influenced by mRNA production rates as well (2). The less-than-expected difference in cell accumulation between KB-31 and the study cells may also not necessarily suggest poor imaging since in vivo imaging with antisense oligomers will probably include carriers to increase cellular accumulation.
| CONCLUSION |
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| ACKNOWLEDGMENTS |
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| FOOTNOTES |
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For correspondence or reprints contact: Kayoko Nakamura, Department of Radiology, Keio University School of Medicine, 35 Shinanomachi, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 160-8582 Japan.
E-mail: kumako{at}sc.itc.keio.ac.jp
| REFERENCES |
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