Killing effect of GCV combined with suicide gene HSVª²tk on human osteosarcoma cells in vitro

    HU Tieª²Shan, LI Guiª²Tao

    Department of Orthopaedics, 177 Hospital, Guangdong Province, Guangzhou 510317, China

    ¡¾Abstract¡¿ AIM: To investigate the killing effect of GCV combined with suicide gene HSVª²tk on SAOSª²2 cells in vitro. METHODS: Retroviral expressing vector pL(tk)SN was generated by recombinant DNA technique. SAOSª²2 was infected by the recombinant retrovirus expressing tk gene. The positive clones were obtained by G418 selection and termed as SAOS/tk. The integration and expression of tk gene in SAOSª²2 cells were identified by RTª²PCR and Southern blot. The growth state and prodrugs¡¯ killing effect of tk gene modified cells were investigated with the expression of tk gene and antitumor effect on SAOSª²2 cells. RESULTS: RTª²PCR and Southern blot analysis confirmed the integration and expression of tk gene in retrovirus transduced SAOSª²2 cells. There was no significant difference in cell proliferation between the SAOS/tk and SAOSª²2. SAOS/tk showed high sensitivity to GCV and bystander effect in vitro. CONCLUSION: The osteosarcoma cells SAOSª²2 are sensitive to HSVª²tk/GCV system and have significant bystander effect, which might have therapeutic potentials for osteosarcoma. ......