Volume Change in Surviving Cells After a Near-Death Experience

Apoptosis is a form of programmed cell death, necessary for tissue health by maintaining a balanced number of cells in our bodies. Previous studies have shown that dying cells shrink during apoptosis, therefore reducing in their volume (Kerr, 1972). However, we do not know what happens to the cell’s volume when cells survive apoptosis initiation, a process named anastasis. The goal of our research is to determine if cells that recover from apoptosis, anastatic cells, have a change in volume. This study is important because it will help fill in the gap in scientific knowledge, and possibly provide insights in how to indirectly modulate a cell's sensitivity to death by volume manipulation. To address this open question, we used cells that can express active caspase in response to doxycycline treatment. We initiated apoptosis by treating human cervical cancer cells (HeLa cells) with doxycycline. After the treatment, we analyzed the volume of the anastatic cells. Our preliminary results show that anastatic cells maintain a relatively normal morphology, suggesting that volume variations - if occurring - are small. We are now in the process of analyzing cell volume in detail using a software called Imaris.

Faculty Mentor: Denise J. Montell

Project Mentor: Maddalena Nano