Glutathione and glutathione-dependent enzymes in ovarian adenocarcinoma cell lines derived from a patient before and after the onset of drug resistance: intrinsic differences and cell cycle effects.

The regulation of glutathione and various glutathione-dependent enzymes has been studied in two ovarian adenocarcinoma cell lines derived from a patient before (PE01) and after (PE04) the onset of drug resistance to cis-platinum, chlorambucil and 5-fluorouracil. Reduced glutathione levels were higher in the drug resistant cells (PE04). This could possibly be attributed to a much higher (6.5-fold) gamma-glutamyl-transpeptidase activity. In addition, glutathione-S-transferase (GST) and glutathione peroxidase were 2.9- and 2.3-fold higher in this cell line. Analysis of the GST subunit composition showed both cell lines contained high levels of the acidic GST and lower concentrations of a basic isozyme. The difference in GST activity between PE01 and PE04 did not appear to be related to the levels of these GST subunits. GSH, glutathione peroxidase and gamma-glutamylcysteinyl synthetase were all found to be regulated during the cell cycle, higher levels being detected in logarithmic versus confluent cultures of PE01 and PE04 and MCF7. This did affect some of the differences between PE01 and PE04 and therefore may be a contributing factor to the differential sensitivity of these cells to cytotoxic compounds. The above data provide the first evidence that tumour cells obtained from a patient before and after the onset of drug resistance have significant differences in glutathione-dependent enzyme content.