ABSTRACT
Objective To investigate the damaging effect of sulfur mustard on the mitochondria in rat lymphocytes in vitro.Methods Rat spleen lymphocytes were isolated by density gradient centrifugation and cultured with 100 ?mol/L sulfur mustard in vitro.DNA ladderring was used to detect the cell apoptosis.Cyt-c release was measured by Western blotting.The mitochondria function was detected by MTT method.Fluorescent probe labeled with Rhodamine 123 was used to study mitochondria potential.Results The mitochondria potential and cell viability decreased at 4 h after treated with 100 ?mol/L sulfur mustard.There was a liner correlation between the mitochondria potential and cell viability in lymphocytes.The content of Cyt-c increased significantly at 4 h as compared with control group in Western blotting.Conclusion Sulfur mustard could damage the rat lymphocyte mitochondria significantly,and mitochondria participates in cytotoxic effect induced by the sulfur mustard.