Prior studies demonstrated that ceramide promotes apoptotic cell death in the human myeloid leukemia cell lines HL-60 and U937 (Jarvis, W. D., Kolesnick, R. N., Fornari, F. A., Jr., Traylor, R. S., Gewirtz, D. A., and Grant, S.(1994) Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 91, 73-77), and that this lethal process is potently suppressed by diglyceride (Jarvis, W. D., Fornari, F. A., Jr., Browning, J. L., Gewirtz, D. A., Kolesnick, R. N., and Grant, S.(1994) J. Biol. Chem. 269, 31685-31692). The present findings document the intrinsic ability of sphingoid bases to induce apoptosis in HL-60 and U937 cells. Exposure to either sphingosine or sphinganine (0.001-10 µM) for 6 h promoted apoptotic degradation of genomic DNA as indicated by (a) electrophoretic resolution of 50-kilobase pair DNA loop fragments and 0.2-1.2-kilobase pair DNA fragment ladders on agarose gels, and (b) spectrofluorophotometric determination of the formation and release of double-stranded fragments and corresponding loss of integrity of bulk DNA. DNA damage correlated directly with reduced cloning efficiency and was associated with the appearance of apoptotic cytoarchitectural traits. At sublethal concentrations (750 nM), however, sphingoid bases synergistically augmented the apoptotic capacity of ceramide (10 µM), producing both a leftward shift in the ceramide concentration-response profile and a pronounced increase in the response to maximally effective levels of ceramide. Thus, sphingosine and sphinganine increased both the potency and efficacy of ceramide. The apoptotic capacity of bacterial sphingomyelinase (50 milliunits/ml) was similarly enhanced by either (a) acute co-exposure to highly selective pharmacological inhibitors of protein kinase C such as calphostin C and chelerythrine or (b) chronic pre-exposure to the non-tumor-promoting protein kinase C activator bryostatin 1, which completely down-modulated total assayable protein kinase C activity. These findings demonstrate that inhibition of protein kinase C by physiological or pharmacological agents potentiates the lethal actions of ceramide in human leukemia cells, providing further support for the emerging concept of a cytoprotective function of the protein kinase C isoenzyme family in the regulation of leukemic cell survival.

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