-Deregulated apoptosis has been associated with many lung diseases. Although many studies have reported the apoptotic effects exhibited by silver nanoparticles (Ag-NPs) in various circumstances, the apoptosis mechanism of Ag-NPs is unclear. We investigated oxidative stress and apoptosis in human normal bronchial epithelial (BEAS-2B) cells to elucidate the role of p53 in apoptosis by Ag-NPs. First, dispersion and stability of Ag-NPs improved using bronchial epithelial cell growth medium with 5% fetal bovine serum. Then, we observed oxidative stress in BEAS-2B cells exposed to Ag-NPs. Second, we carried out a cell death assay to measure DNA fragmentation as a biomarker of apoptosis. BEAS--mentation. We also found that apoptosis-related genes (caspase-3, Bax, and Bcl-2) were regulated by AgNPs, which was detected by mRNA and protein levels. These results suggest that Ag-NPs induced p53-Ag-NPs in pulmonary disease.
Original ArticleThe Journal of Toxicological Sciences (J. Toxicol. Sci.) Vol.39, No.3, 401-412, 2014 Vol. 39 No. 3 401 lar and DNA damage (Risom et al., 2005). DNA damage induces extracellular and intracellular signals that trigger the onset of a signaling cascade with characteristic biochemical and morphological features, including nuclear condensation, membrane blebbing, and DNA fragmentation, leading ultimately to cell death (Johnson et al., 1996). This is called apoptosis, which is essential for the normal functioning and survival of multi-cellular organisms. However, deregulated apoptosis has been associated with many lung diseases because toxic contents are released from apoptotic cells unless the cells are quickly recognized or ingested by phagocytes (Pandya et al., 2006).The p53 gene regulates the apoptosis pathway (Korsmeyer, 1995;Yang and Duerksen-Hughes, 1998) and is tightly controlled through a complex series of events including translational regulation, interaction with regu--cations including multisite phosphorylation and acetylation (Giaccia and Kastan, 1998;Meek, 1999;Prives and Hall, 1999). In particular, phosphorylation of the serine-15 (Ser-15) residue due to DNA damage plays an important role in p53-mediated apoptosis (Dumaz and Meek, 1999;Siliciano et al., 1997;Unger et al., 1999). This activation of p53 leads to expression of its downstream effectors such as Bax, Bcl-2 and caspase-3, resulting in apoptosis (Martin and Elkon, 2004).In this study, we hypothesized that Ag-NPs induce apoptosis via the p53 signaling pathway in normal human lung bronchial epithelial (BEAS-2B) cells. Although many reports have shown apoptotic effects of Ag-NPs in various circumstances (Foldbjerg et al., 2009;Li et al., 2010;Miura and Shinohara, 2009;Piao et al., 2011), the were used to elucidate the role of p53 in apoptosis by Ag--sion of TiO 2 NPs improved by adding bovine serum albumin (BSA) or fetal bovine serum (FBS) to the medium (Ji et al., 2010). Thus, Ag-NPs were dispersed in bronchial epithelial growth medium (BEGM) with 5% FBS and were characterized. Then, we observed ROS generation...