CUP Undergraduate Research
Title
Chloroquine and its Effects on K562 Cells
Date of Award
4-1-2014
Document Type
Restricted Access Thesis
College
College of Theology, Arts, & Sciences
Department
Math & Science
Degree Name
Biology, BA
First Advisor
Dr. Rici Hallstrand
Abstract
Chloroquine, an effective anti-malarial drug, has recently become of interest to cancer researchers. The focus of this experiment is what effect chloroquine has on K562 cells. K562 cells are a line of human bone marrow chronic myelogenous leukemia cells that are useful in research due to their undifferentiated status. Previous research has looked at how chloroquine can kill cancer cells, especially when in concert with chemotherapy. This experiment will see if chloroquine alone has a detrimental effect on cancer cells.
K562 cell cultures were treated with a 0, 10, 20, 40, 100, 200 µM chloroquine dilution series and cell concentration per mL was determined at 24, 48, and 72 hours. The viability of the cells was done through trypan blue exclusion. The results of this experiment showed that chloroquine kills K562 cells in a time and dose dependent way. LD50 numbers were also calculated for 24, 48, and 72 hours. However, this experiment did not explore what the mechanism of cell death is when K562 cells are treated with chloroquine.