Abstract
The morphology changes, in particular the organization of microtubules in mammalian nonmalignant HMEC 184A1 and cancerous MCFβ7 cells during curcumin treatment have been investigated by utilizing multiphoton, fluorescence, and atomic force (AFM) microscopies. Fluorescence microscopy reveals formation of ringβlike structures of microtubules circumscribing the nuclear area in HMEC 184A1 cells after treatment, while in MCFβ7 cells, no important changes were observed. Topography analyses of fixed HMEC 184A1 and MCFβ7 before and after treatment with curcumin were performed using AFM and the effect of the employed cells' fixation method was investigated on MCFβ7 cells. Due to its indepth optical sectioning capacity multiphoton microscopy provided valuable complementary information on curcumin's effect on both cells' types. Combining information provided by AFM and optical fluorescence and biphoton microscopes allows us to gain a better understanding of the cells and their curcuminβinduced changes, especially for microtubules which are the main target of antitumor chemotherapy treatments. Our multimicroscopic study demonstrates that 6 h incubation with curcumin does not induce significant modifications in the interphase microtubules in the malignant MCF7cell, whereas it has measurable effects on those of the nonmalignant HMEC 184A1 cells, revealing also morphology modifications over the nuclear area of these cells. (Β© 2011 WILEYβVCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)