Two UVC-induced stress response pathways in HeLa cells identified by cDNA microarray

Environmental toxins induce multiple effects in vivo, involving various molecular pathways. The ultraviolet C (UVC, 254 nm) component of sunlight can cause strong cytotoxic and genotoxic effects. In this study, UVC-induced stress response factors were analyzed by cDNA microarray, using the Millennium(R) Nylon membrane chip system. HeLa cells were irradiated with 30 Joule/m(2)/sec UVC, incubated for 30 or 60 minutes and then subjected to the analysis. Multiple chips were used for each experimental condition so that the data could be analyzed statistically. Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to identify groups of genes whose expression changed in a similar manner with time post-UVC irradiation. Three major factors were identified, depending on the directionality of expression changes in each gene. The factor loadings in all three identified gene groups were high, indicating that genes within each group were highly correlated. Two factors exhibited significantly changed expression patterns after 30 minutes of incubation but in the opposite direction. This indicates that the immediate early UVC-induced stress response was elicited by two major pathways. Interestingly, expression of the genomic damage-inducible GADD genes, as well as p53, was initially decreased, unlike the immediate early genes Fos/Jun and Egr-1, which were strongly increased after 30 minutes of incubation. The results indicate that PCA used in the analysis of pre-hypothesized, functionally related genes can identify the potential subpathways in a group. This method provides a novel approach for identifying functionally-related genes in microarray studies. (C) 2002 Wiley-Liss, Inc.