Effects of biochanin A on the growth and differentiation of myeloid leukemia WEHI-3B (JCS) cells

The effects of biochanin A on the growth and differentiation of a recently characterized myeloid leukemia cell line WEHI-3B (JCS) were investigated. Biochanin A not only inhibited the growth of JCS cells in a dose-dependent manner (0 - 200 mu M) but also induced the morphological differentiation of JCS cells. The phagocytic activity of biochanin A-treated JCS cells was also increased. Flow cytometric analysis showed that the expression of macrophage differentiation markers Mac-1 and F4180 was up-regulated in biochanin A-treated JCS cells. The expression level of Mac-1 was higher than that of F4/80. The expression of cytokine genes was studied by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and cycle titration. mRNA levels of IL-1 alpha, IL-1 beta and IL-4 were found to be up-regulated at 46 hours after incubation of JCS cells with biochanin A. Although the expression of LIF was also up-regulated, the LIF receptor gene was not expressed in the uninduced or induced JCS cells. Our results suggest that IL-1 alpha, IL-1 beta and IL-4 may act on the later stage of biochanin A-mediated differentiation of JCS cells.