Re: Apoptosis

Mike Salmon (salmonm@rheuma.bham.ac.uk)
Tue, 18 Jul 1995 17:59:29 +0000

> I am looking into apoptosis of hybridoma cells in cell culture. I decided to try
> ApoTag. However, a question was raised concerning FAS antibody. My
> understanding is that the presence of FAS does not indicate cellular apoptosis;
> however, FAS presence on the cell surface does not give an answer as definite as
> fragments detection. Could somebody explain the relationship of the two? Thanks
> a lot.
>
> K. Lin at KLIN@STEM.com

Fas is a molecule expressed on the surface of cells which acts as a
receptor for the Fas ligand. Triggering of this receptor under
appropriate circumstances induces apoptosis in the cell which
expresses Fas. High level expression of this molecule is therefore
associated with high susceptibility to apoptosis, and T cells which are
triggered in this way cannot be rescued by IL-2, IL-15 etc or by
fibroblast co-culture which works with other induction routes. It
appears to be largely independant of bcl-2/Bax, bclx or p53
expression. Fas expression DOES NOT indicate that the cell is
actually apoptosing at the moment, only that it is suceptible to Fas-ligand
induced death.

Have fun

Mike

...........................................................
Mike Salmon
Department of Rheumatology
The Medical School
University of Birmingham
Birmingham B15 2TT
United Kingdom
Tel: 44 (0)121 414 6780
Fax: 44 (0)121 414 6794