Department of Experimental Evolutionary Biology, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
Mutat Res. 2012 Dec 12;749(1-2):76-81. doi: 10.1016/j.mrgentox.2012.07.004. Epub 2012 Sep 7.
Mobile genetic elements represent an important source of mutation and genomic instability, and their activity can be influenced by several chemical and physical agents. In this research we address the question whether exposure to extremely low-frequency pulsed magnetic fields (EMF-PMF) could affect the mobility of the human LINE-1(RP) retrotransposon. To this purpose, an in vitro retrotransposition assay was used on human neuroblastoma BE(2) cells exposed for 48h to 1mT, 50Hz PMF, or sham-exposed. Moreover, since it is well known that retrotransposition causes DNA double-strand breaks (DSB), an estimation of γ-H2AX foci, which is a marker of DNA DSB, was carried out on PMF- and sham-exposed samples. The results show that PMF-exposed cells had a lower number of both retrotransposition events and DNA DSB compared with sham-exposed samples. These results suggest that exposure to PMF can interfere with retrotransposition activity by inducing a decrease of retrotransposition events.
移动遗传元件代表了突变和基因组不稳定性的一个重要来源，它们的活性可以受到几种化学和物理因子的影响。在这项研究中，我们探讨了暴露于极低频脉冲磁场（EMF-PMF）是否会影响人类 LINE-1(RP) 反转录转座子的迁移率。为此，我们使用体外反转录转座酶测定法对人类神经母细胞瘤 BE(2)细胞进行了研究，这些细胞在 1mT、50Hz PMF 或假暴露下暴露了 48 小时。此外，由于众所周知反转录转座会导致 DNA 双链断裂（DSB），我们对 PMF 和假暴露样本进行了 γ-H2AX 焦点的估计，这是 DNA DSB 的标志物。结果表明，与假暴露样本相比，PMF 暴露的细胞的反转录转座事件和 DNA DSB 数量均较低。这些结果表明，暴露于 PMF 可以通过诱导反转录转座事件的减少来干扰反转录转座活性。
