Oxidative Stress Of Melanoma Caner Cells Induced By Atmospheric Pressure Cold Plasma

Atmospheric pressure cold plasma that contains numerous act ive components including electrons, ions, free radicals, reacti ve molecules and photons has been extensively researched as a promising anticancer treatment technology in recent years¹. Melanoma is the most aggressive form of skin cancer with a high prevalence, a median overall survival of less than 2 year s, and resistance to current modalities of cancer therapy². Plas ma can inactivate melanoma caner cells effectively, but the m echanism of the interaction between plasma and cells is not y et fully understood and needs to be investigated further. In this work, an improved atmospheric pressure plasma jet (A PPJ) with three electrodes in helium was utilized for treatmen t of murine melanoma caner cells cultured in vitro. After bein g exposed to APPJ with different time durations, the cell viab ility, transmission electron microscopy (TEM) images, intrac ellular superoxide dismutase (SOD), malondialdehyde (MD A), reactive oxygen species (ROS) and cell cycle distribution of melanoma cells were measured, respectively. It was show ed that, compared with the control cells, the cell viability and SOD activity decreased, the degree of cell damage, MDA an d ROS content increased in a time-dependent manner with 10, 30, and 60 s of plasma treatment. Furthermore, the APPJ ma y reduced cell viability of melanoma cells via inducing G1/S and G2/M cell cycle arrest. It was concluded that oxidative st ress in melanoma cells was mainly induced by the reactive ox ygen and nitrogen species (ROS and RNS) in the plasma jet, which were detected by optical emission spectroscopy.