Nucleic Acids Research, 1978, Vol. 5, No. 12 4795-4804
© 1978
Articles |
Caffeine inhibits excision of 7-bromomethylbenz (a) anthracene-DNA adducts from exponentially growing but not from stationary phase Chinese hamster cells
Institute of Cancer Research, Chemical Carcinogenesis Division, Pollards Wood Research Station Nightingales Lane, Chalfont St. Giles, Bucks. HP8 4SP, UK
Received October 4, 1978. Excision of 7-bromomethylbenz(a)anthracene (7-BMBA)-DNA adducts from exponentially growing cultures of Chinese hamster V79-379A cells followed logarithmic kinetics with a half-life of approximately 20 hrs. Post-treatment incubation in the presence of a sub-toxic concentration of caffeine markedly reduced this loss. Caffeine brought about a concomitant increase in overall DNA synthetic rate in treated exponential cultures. Excision in stationary, non-DNA-replicating cultures, was slower and caffeine did not affect this reduced rate of excision. These findings lend support to a previous proposition that the caffeine-induced inhibition of elongation of nascent DNA on a template containing chemical lesions results in an interference with the excision repair mechanism that removes these lesions.