[Ultrastructure of HeLa cella after exposure to nickel ions]

Dose-dependent progress of destructive processes (mitochondria destruction, proteolysis, autophagocytosis) is observed in HeLa cells treated with various concentrations of nickel (0.05-4 micrograms/ml) for 2, 4 and 24 hours. Parallel with it the compensation and adaptation responses of cells (increase of mitochondrion polymorphism, appearance of "macropolysomes", hypertrophy of the Golgi complex) take place.