The effect of 5-azacytidine and cytidine analogs onDrosophila melanogaster cells in culture.

The effects of cytidine and cytidine analogs were studied inDrosophila embryonic cell cultures and two wild-type established cell lines, Oregon-R and Schneider line 2. Primary embryonic cultures have been shown to be an excellent system for the study of embryonic development; a number of cell types undergo normal differentiation in vitro. Treatment of these cultures with putative teratogens resulted in an inhibition of muscle and/or neuron differentiation in our study. Treatment of these cells with cytidine and seven other analogs had no effect on neuron and muscle differentiation. The compound 5-azacytidine, when added to primary cell cultures, inhibited normal differentiation at subtoxic doses while inducing the production of three proteins that comigrate with the heat-shock proteins, hsp 23, 22a and 22b. 5-Azacytidine did not stimulate differentiation in Oregon-R or SchneiderDrosophila cell lines. The in vitro blockage of differentiation by 5-azacytidine suggests that it may act as a teratogen.