Histone deacetylase inhibitor sodium butyrate enhances cellular radiosensitivity by inhibiting both DNA nonhomologous end joining and homologous recombination.

HDAC inhibitors have been proposed as radiosensitizers in cancer therapy. Their application would permit the use of lower radiation doses and would reduce the adverse effects of the treatment. However, the molecular mechanisms of their action remain unclear.

Sodium butyrate enhances the cytotoxic effect of cisplatin by abrogating the cisplatin imposed cell cycle arrest.

Background: Histone deacetylase inhibitors have been proposed as potential enhancers of the cytotoxic effect of cisplatin and other anticancer drugs. Their application would permit the use of lower therapeutic doses and reduction of the adverse side effects of the drugs. However, the molecular mechanisms by which they sensitize the cells towards anticancer drugs are not known in details, which is an obstacle in developing effective therapeutic protocols.

Tumor-specific protein human galectin-1 interacts with anticancer agents.

The present work shows a novel binding activity of the tumor specific lectin--recombinant human galectin-1 (hGal-1)--to three porphyrin compounds: (1) Zn-porphyrin (ZnTPPS); (2) Mn-porphyrin and (3) Au-porphyrin. These compounds are widely applied in the photodynamic therapy of cancer (PDT). Our data indicate that hGal-1, similar to some plant lectins, a bacterial lectin from Pseudomonas aeruginosa and an animal lectin from Helix pomatia, possesses dual functions binding to both carbohydrate and non-carbohydrate ligands.

Comparison of the global genomic and transcription-coupled repair rates of different lesions in human cells.

There are two subclasses of nucleotide excision repair (NER). One is the global genomic repair (GGR) which removes lesions throughout the genome regardless of whether any specific sequence is transcribed or not. The other is the transcription-coupled repair (TCR), which removes lesions only from the transcribed DNA sequences.

DNA interstrand crosslinks repair in mammalian cells.

We studied the formation of double strand breaks (DSBs) as intermediates in the repair of DNA interstrand crosslinks (ICLs) by homologous recombination (HR). The plasmid EGFP-N1 was crosslinked with trioxsalen to give one ICL per plasmid on average. HeLa cells were transfected with the crosslinked plasmids and the ICL repair was monitored by following the restoration of the GFP expression.