Morphological and growth alterations in Vero cells transformed by cisplatin

Cisplatin is an antineoplastic agent used to treat solid tumours, such as ovarian, testicular and bladder tumours. However, studies in vitro and in vivo have shown that cisplatin is mutagenic, genotoxic and tumorigenic in other tissues and organs. In this work, we examined the effect of cisplatin on Vero cells, a fibroblast-like cell line. The morphological characteristics were investigated using phase contrast microscopy, scanning electron microscopy and the actin cytoskeleton was labelled with fluorescein isothiocyanate-phalloidin. Cell proliferation was assessed based on the growth curve. Cultured Vero cells treated with cisplatin showed behavioural and morphological alterations associated with cellular transformation. The transformed cells grew in multilayers and formed cellular aggregates. The proliferation and morphological characteristics of the transformed cells were very different from those of control ones. Since transformed Vero cells showed several characteristics related to neoplastic growth, these cells could be a useful model for studying tumour cells in vitro.