Immunochemical determination of an initial step in thymine dimer excision repair in xeroderma pigmentosum variant fibroblasts and biopsy material from the normal population and patients with basal cell carcinoma and melanoma.

A monoclonal antibody specific for u.v.-induced thymine-thymine dimers in single-stranded DNA has been used in an enzyme immunoassay to investigate the loss of antigenicity associated with repair of this lesion in the first 2 h following 10 J/m2 254 nm radiation. Variances of +/- 10% for the method and +/- 6.5% for individuals were established using primary cultures of biopsies from healthy individuals. No differences in the rate of loss of antigenicity was observed between 20 normal lymphocyte samples and 10 normal skin biopsies. Of three xeroderma pigmentosum (XP) variant cell lines tested, GM3617 could not be distinguished from normal cells but GM1227 and GM3053 showed lower rates of loss than any of the healthy samples. When the group mean values were compared there was no significant difference between normals and biopsies from sun-shielded skin areas from 16 basal cell carcinomas but similar material from 10 melanoma patients showed a significantly reduced (P = 0.001) rate of loss of antigenicity. Since the rate of loss of antigenicity in normal and XP variant cells reflected their relative abilities to perform unscheduled DNA synthesis, our results suggest that some melanoma patients may also have a minor deficiency in an early stage of excision repair.