The antitumour agent 5-(3,3-dimethyl-1-triazeno) imidazole-4-carboxamide (DTIC) inhibits rat liver cAMP phosphodiesterase and amplifies hormone effects in hepatocytes and hepatoma cells.

The antitumour agent 5-(3,3-dimethyl-1-triazeno)imidazole-4-carboxamide (DTIC) was found to inhibit competitively the low-Km cyclic AMP phosphodiesterase activity in an ammonium-sulphate-precipitable fraction of the 2,000g supernatant of rat liver. With substrate concentration at 0.25 microM, I50 was 790 microM for DTIC and 350 microM for theophylline. DTIC at 2 mM more than doubled the cAMP response to glucagon in hepatocytes and to adrenaline in MH1C1 hepatoma cells, indicating that it also exerts its inhibitory effect on the phosphodiesterase in intact cells. The possible contribution of the phosphodiesterase inhibition to the growth-inhibitory and cytotoxic effects of DTIC is discussed.