Scanning electron microscopy of surface features of hamster embryo cells transformed in vitro by X-irradiation

Scanning electron microscope studies were carried out on Syrian hamster embryo cells transformed in vitro by X-irradiation (300 rads) (X-ray transformed) and on normal nonirradiated and irradiated nontransformed controls. Transformed cells appeared in scanning electron microscopy as pleomorphic, thick cells piling up over each other and exhibiting extensive surface features consisting of microvilli, blebs, and ruffles. These surface structures were seen on single as well as on densely cultured transformed cells during both interphase and mitosis. The complex surface was observed shortly after transformation (on cells of a 20-day-old clone) and seems a permanent feature of the X-ray-transformed cells (present after 8 years in culture). All controls appeared by scanning electron microscopy as regular, flat, and smooth cells which grew in high-density cultures to seemingly contact-inhibited monolayers. During mitosis the normal cells (control, nontransformed) displayed surface excrescences similar to those of the transformed cells making the mitotic normal cells indistinguishable from transformed cells. The complex surface features in the normal cells were temporary and reversed back to characteristic smoothness upon reentrance into interphase.