Kinetics of Microcolonies of Cultured Mammalian Cells after Bleomycin Treatment

Abstract

Cultured ascites hepatoma cells of the rat were treated with 400 to 900 R of gamma rays or 25 to 100μg/ml of bleomycin for 30 min. The cells were followed up for 133 hr and the pedigrees were analyzed. Gamma rays and 2 low doses of bleomycin gave rise to typical reproductive death in generations 1 and 2 but 100μg of the drug produced frequent interphase death. Natural death and induced death did not follow statistical randomness suggesting an existence of weak and sensitive clones in a population.