Membrane damage by staphylococcal alpha-toxin to different types of cultured mammalian cell.

Staphylococcal alpha-toxin was shown to be more membrane-damaging to epithelial-like cells than to neuroblasts or normal fibroblasts. Mouse adrenal cortex tumor (Y1Ac) epithelioid cells and human embryonal lung (MRC-5) fibroblasts were used for further comparison. Alpha-toxin was considerably more cytotoxic to adrenal cells than to fibroblasts. This difference did not depend on the presence fibronectin on the fibroblast surface, or on a general difference in the response to other membrane-damaging hemolytic toxins and detergents. Incubation of adrenal cells at 0 degree C with alpha-toxin induced some irreversible change, and membrane damage and a cytotoxic effect developed upon further incubation in toxin-free growth medium. In fibroblasts the membrane damage progressed slowly and only in the continued presence of the toxin. Toxin-induced damage to transport and synthetic functions in fibroblasts was reversible upon removal of the toxin after prolonged exposure. It is proposed that adrenal cells may carry a cell-surface receptor to which alpha-toxin binds specifically, thereby allowing the toxin to exert its cell damaging effect.