The effect of paraquat on autophagy in human embryonic neural progenitor cells

To explore the effect of paraquat (PQ) on autophagy in human embryonic neural progenitor cells.Using ReNcell CX cell model. After treatment with various concentration (0.00, 1.00, 10.00 and 100.00 μmol/L) of PQ, CCK8 assay was used to detect the cell viability, the transmission electron microscope was used to observe the the cell ultrastructure, the real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) was adopted to detect mRNA expression of autophagy related genes which including LC3, Atg12, Atg5, beclin1, Atg7 and mTOR and apoptosis related genes Bax and Bcl-2.The cell viability was significantly inhibited after administered with 100.00 μmol/L of PQ (P<0.01). The mRNA expression of Beclin1 was significantly up-regulated and the emergency of autophagosome were observed at the concentration of 1.00 μmol/L group, while mild cell apoptosis, significantly up-regulated Atg5, Atg8, Atg7 and Atg12 mRNA expression as well as down-regulated expression of mTOR and Bax were detected at the 10.00 μmol/L of PQ group, howere, the obvious apoptosis and the up-regulated mRNA expression of mTOR and Bax were observed at the 100.00 μmol/L of PQ group, the mRNA expression of Bcl-2 were all down-regulated after administered with 1.00, 10.00 and 100.00 μmol/L of PQ and reached the lowest level at the concentration of 10.00 μmol/L.PQ can induced autophagy at the low concentration in ReNcell CX cell and autophagy might serve as a protective mechanism to ameliorate PQ-induced cytotoxic effects but apoptosis will be induced at the 100 μmol/L concentration.