Radiation injuries to chromosomes in lymphocytes of patients with hereditary diseases

The authors studied dose dependences of the output of choromosomal aberrations in peripheral blood lymphocytes during γ-irradiation in vitro in patients with Parkinson's syndrome, in a patient with progeria, in a child with translocational Down's syndrome and his mother, phenotypically normal woman, with translocation, and also in control donors. Irradiation was conducted up to the stimulation with PHA (stage Go) from the source 60Co in the dose range of 0.25-3.0 Gy. It was established that the output of metabolic aberrations is depicted by the linear-quadratic function of the dose better than by the grade one. The lymphocytes of one of the female patients with Parkinson's syndrome suffering from papilloma of the larynx showed an increase in the spontaneous level of chromosomal abberrations and also a tendency to an increase in the fragment output in comparison with the control. The lymphocytes of the patient with progeria showed an insignificantly increased spontaneous level of chromosomal aberrations and a considerable increase in the output of radiation-induced exchanges. In the child with translocational Down's syndrome the output of radiation-induced exchanges was increased in comparison with control, mainly with doses less than 1 Gy and in the lymphocytes of the woman with translocation the output of fragments was increased. In both cases the increase in the spontaneous level of aberrations was observed. A relationship between increased radiosensitivity and the inclusion of patients into a high risk group with reference to a relative increase in the incidence of malignant neoplasms and reduced life span is discussed