Intramitochondrial dyes allow selective in vitro photolysis of carcinoma cells.

Carcinoma cell mitochondria preferentially accumulate and retain certain cationic dyes to a much greater extent than most normal cells. Thus, they can potentially serve as targets for highly selective photochemotherapy. We evaluated 10 rhodamine and cyanine dyes as carcinoma-specific mitochondrial photosensitizers in vitro. The most effective, N,N'-bis(2-ethyl-1,3-dioxolane)kryptocyanine (EDKC), caused marked, light-dependent killing of human bladder, squamous, and colon carcinoma cell lines after 30-min incubations at 1-0.01 microM but was minimally toxic to human keratinocytes and to normal monkey kidney epithelial cells (CV-1). Carcinoma cell phototoxicity was proportional to the amount of dye incorporated by the different cell lines. Selective killing ratios were 70-1000 for 0.1 microM dye and light doses of 100-175 J/cm2 between 680 and 720 nm.