Quantification of p21 gene expression in Caco-2 cells treated with sodium butyrate using real-time reverse transcription-PCR (RT-PCR) assay.

Butyric acid, a short chain fatty-acid derived from bacterial fermentation of complex carbohydrates in the large intestine has been shown to be a growth inhibitory in many colon cancer cell lines. Butyrate induced inhibition of cellular proliferation is considered to result from the induction of P21 gene expression through the activation of this gene transcription. P21 is an inhibitor of cyclin-dependent protein kinases that are required for the cells to enter the DNA synthesis phase. In the present study the kinetics of the changes of the P21 transcription in Caco-2 colon adenocarcinoma cells treated with various concentrations of sodium butyrate was determined using a novel real-time quantitative RT-PCR (TaqMan) technique. Beta-actin mRNA and GAPDH mRNA levels were used as the endogenous references. Colonocytes were incubated with sodium butyrate at concentrations of 5 mM, 10 mM and 20 mM for 3, 6, 12, 24 and 48 h. The results of this study indicated that butyrate strongly induced P21 gene expression as early as 3 h after treatment. Characteristic patterns of time-dependent changes of the target gene expression were observed. The increases in P21 mRNA level were generally more pronounced at higher butyrate concentrations. Because Caco-2 cells are lacking the wild allele of the P53 gene, the present results support the hypothesis that butyrate induces P21 gene expression by P53-independent mechanism.