Comparison of repair of overall genomic DNA damage and of the p53 and hTERT gene regions in (A) RT112 cells (B) RT4 cells following 5Gy radiation.

<p>Each graph shows the mean % of cells showing γ-radiation-induced damage (▴). A cell was considered to have γ-radiation-induced DNA damage if its mean % DNA measurement had a greater value than the mean % DNA value for control cells for that cell line (control values shown in key on each graph). The mean % of cells showing p53 (•) and hTERT (▪) hybridisation spots in the comet tail is also shown for each cell line. For both cell-lines the rate of repair of overall genomic DNA and hTERT is similar (as shown by slope of lines), whereas the rate of repair of p53 is significantly faster during the first 15 minutes (P<0.05 for both cell lines). Each data point represents the mean ± SEM of two independent experiments.