Abstract
It has been known that ultraviolet light (UV) A, B and C damage the cells and lead mutation and/or death by generating reactive oxygen species (ROS) in the cell and/or forming photoproducts such as pyrimidine dimer on DNA. In order to elucidate the ratio of repairable damage induced by each wave length, the sensitivity of Escherichia coli mutants of DNA repair and of ROS scavenging enzymes to UV-A, B and C was investigated. Three UV lamps illuminating each wave length were used. DNA repair mutants used were WP2(wild), WP2uvrA(uvrA), CM571(recA) and WP100(uvrArecA) and ROS scavenging enzyme lacking mutants used were DSH7(wild), DSH19(katEG), DSH56(sodAB) and DSH76(katEGsodAB). As the results, it is suggested that UV-A, B and C induce photoproducts including pyrimidine dimer on DNA which are repairable and that UV-A and B generate ROS in the cells but UV-C does not. [J Radiat Res 44:414 (2003)]
