Anti-proliferative and genotoxic effect of arsenic and lead on human brain cancer cell line

Arsenic and lead are ubiquitously distributed in environment and are known to have genotoxic,carcinogenic and mutagenic effects. in the present study anti-proliferative and genotoxic effects of arsenic and lead were tested on sf767 cells. cells were exposed to different concentrations of arsenic and lead for 24 and 48 h and anti-proliferative effects were tested using neutral red uptake assay. comet assay was conducted to study the genotoxic effect. there was decrease in growth and change in morphology of cells with increase in concentrations of arsenic and lead. dna damage was observed in metal treated cells,compared to control (untreated) cells. ten different comet parameters were investigated for treated and untreated cells. the results of dna damage by arsenic and lead were comparable. present study clearly demonstrates that both arsenic and lead have anti-proliferative and genotoxic effect on sf676 cells. copyright 2014 zoological society of pakistan.