Selective adhesion inhibition and hyaluronan envelope reduction of dermal tumor cells by cold plasma-activated medium

The sensitivity to cold plasma is specific to tumor cells while leaving normal tissue cells unaffected. This is the desired challenge in cancer therapy. Therefore, the focus of this work was a comparative study concerning the plasma sensitivity of dermal tumor cells (A-431) versus non-tumorigenic dermal cells (HaCaT) regarding their adhesion capacity. We found a selective inhibiting effect of plasma-activated medium on the adhesion of tumor cells while hardly affecting normal cells. We attributed this to a lower basal gene expression for the adhesion-relevant components CD44, hyaluronan synthase 2 (HAS2), HAS3, and the hyaluronidases in A431. Noteworthy, after plasma exposure, we revealed a significantly higher expression and synthesis of the hyaluronan envelope, the HAS3 gene, and the transmembrane adhesion receptors in non-tumorigenic HaCaTs.