Viability Reduction of Melanoma Cells by Plasma Jet via Inducing G1/S and G2/M Cell Cycle Arrest and Cell Apoptosis

Abstract

This paper is aimed to investigate the inhibition effect and mechanism of low-temperature plasma (LTP) on melanoma cells. An argon atmospheric pressure plasma jet is used to generate LTP for the treatment of B16 murine melanoma cells cultured in vitro . LTP treatment time intervals are set as 5, 10, 15, and 20 s, respectively. After being treated with LTP, cell viability, cell apoptosis, cell cycle distribution, and cycle-related proteins expression of melanoma cells are, respectively, measured. It is found that, compared with the control cells, treatment of melanoma cells with 10, 15, and 20 s of plasma, result in a significant reduction in cell viability. Furthermore, investigation demonstrates that LTP may reduce cell viability of melanoma cells via inducing G1/S and G2/M cell cycle arrest and cell apoptosis, and alteration of cell cycle is due to down-modulation of the expression of CyclinB1 and CyclinD1 protein induced by LTP.