PMA and doxorubicin decrease viability, MTT activity and expression of CD10 marker on NALM-1 leukemic cells.

PMA (10, 20 ng/ml) and doxorubicin (5-20 ng/ml) decreased the viability and MTT-activity of NALM-1 pre-B leukemic cells (3 days' treatment). Further, CD10 was downregulated, suggesting that PMA and doxorubicin induced differentiation of NALM-1 cells. However, PMA did not alter expression of B cell markers CD20 and of mIgM. In contrast to PMA, another differentiation agent ATRA did not alter CD10 expression on NALM-1 cells but affected viability after 6 days (5, 10 ng/ml). The data in this study are the first evidence that PMA and doxorubicin inhibited viability and MTT activity and induced partial differentiation, by decreasing CD10 on NALM-1 cells.