Benzoapyrene-Induced DNA-Protein Crosslinks in Cultured Human Lymphocytes and the Role of the GSTM1 and GSTT1 Genotypes

ABSTRACT

We investigated the influence of glutathione S-transferase M1 (GSTM1) and glutathione S-transferase T1 (GSTT1) polymorphisms upon DNA-protein crosslinks (DPC) induced by benzo[a]pyrene (B[a]P) in cultured human lymphocytes. Lymphocyte samples were collected from 30 healthy nonsmoking hospital administrative workers. DPC was detected with KCl-SDS assay and the distributions of GSTM1 and GSTT1 were determined by polymerase chain reaction. B[a]P was found to induce a significant dose-responsive increase in cytotoxicity and DPC regardless of the genotypes (p0.05). In terms of the genes examined, the level of cytotoxicity and DPC formation were found to be highest in the GSTM1-null and GSTT1-null cells. In conclusion, B[a]P induced a significant increase in the cytotoxicity and the level of DPC formation in cultured human lymphocytes. Our findings suggest that DPC could be used as a biomarker of B[a]P exposure.