The surface characteristics of cancer cells play an important role in altered behavior leading to invasion and metastasis. Furthermore, many cancer treatments focus on the surface properties of these cells. Much work has been done on the surface characteristics of cancer cells, but most of the studies have focused on only one cell surface component at a time. In this study, 5 different cell lines were used: human normal colon cell line CCD-33Co, tumorigenic colon cancer cell line COLO 201, human lung carcinoma DMS 79, human tumorigenic colon cancer cell line COLO 320 HSR, and human normal colon cell line CCD-18Co. All five cell lines were assayed with beads derivatized with 56 different compounds including amino acids, peptides, carbohydrates, and lectins. Beads and cells were washed individually and then mixed together, in over a thousand trials, in order to determine which cell lines bound to which derivatized beads. P-values were then obtained using a Fisher Exact Test (SPSS), suggesting whether beads bound to at least one of the five cell lines in a significantly different manner than to the other cell lines. The percentage of positive binding trials with each bead varied significantly among the cell lines tested, with some beads binding to certain cell lines and not at all to other cell lines. A few beads bound significantly to every cell line: maltose, p-aminobenzyl-1-thio-~-D-galactopyranoside, poly-L-lysine and L-arginine. Other beads bound to only the colon cell lines: Arachis hypogaea, Dolichos biflorus, Concanavalin A, Type III-A, cellobiose and Lens cuhnaris. L-serine bound to normal colon cell lines and the lung carcinoma cell line, but not the cancerous colon cell lines. There were also a few notable bead binding results where only one bead type bound to one cell line, and no other cell lines. The beads involved in this single cell line binding were: Triticum vulgaris-Sepharose 6MB and L-glutamine which bound only to COLO 320 HSR; Phytolacca americana which only bound to CCD-33Co; L-glutamic acid and Vicia villosa (hairy vetch) isolectin B4 which bound only to human colon cell line CCD-l 8Co; and L-proline which bound only to cell line DMS-79. This survey, using this assay, is the first of many steps to progressively build a library of human cell line surface properties. Such libraries of cell surface markers may potentially lead to the development anti-cancer drugs and new approaches to the prognosis of cancers. Further experiments could lead to a better understanding of the surface properties identified in this survey.California State University, Northridge. Department of Biology.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 62-66
