ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Fluorescence imaging of actin cytoskeleton changes in cancer cells upon chemotherapy
1 Research Institute of Biomedical Technologies,
Nizhny Novgorod State Medical Academy, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia
2 Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod – National Research University, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia
3 Laboratory of Biophotonics, Department of Genetics and Postgenomic Technologies,
M. M. Shemyakin and Yu. A. Ovchinnikov Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia
Correspondence should be addressed: Natalia Klementieva
pl. Minina i Pozharskogo, d. 10/1, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, 603005; moc.liamg@aveitnemelkvn
Funding: this work was supported by the Russian Science Foundation (project no. 14-25-00129).
Acknowledgements: authors thank the IBCH Core Facility for the equipment.
Structural organization of actin and actin-binding proteins can be a hallmark of aggressiveness among various populations of solid tumor cells. Here, we studied the impact of chemotherapeutic drugs (paclitaxel and cisplatin) on actin and alpha-actinin structural patterns in human cervical adenocarcinoma cell culture HeLa Kyoto using total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy and single-molecule localization super-resolution microscopy. It was shown that paclitaxel causes disruption of actin cytoskeleton in cancer cells, both for actin and alpha-actinin. We observed disappearance of stress fibers, accumulation of filaments in the cell cortex and morphological changes in focal contacts. With cisplatin, we detected a lower number of thin actin bundles and more dense arrangement of alpha-actinin. Our results suggest that the actin cytoskeleton is a potential target for antitumor chemotherapy.
Keywords: actin, alpha-actinin, microfilaments, cervical carcinoma cell culture, paclitaxel, cisplatin, fluorescence imaging