Fig. 3. ATP release upon treatment of multicellular tumor spheroids with DC
electrical fields. ATP release after electrical field treatment (750
Vm-1, 60 seconds) was evalulated by luciferin/luciferase-based
bioluminescence. Between 30 and 50 tumor spheroids were treated with an
electrical field pulse and subsequently an 150 µl aliquot of the
supernatant was analyzed in the bioluminescence apparatus. Pretreatment for 30
minutes with the anion channel inhibitors niflumic acid (200 µM), NPPB (50
µM) and tamoxifen (50 µM) significantly inhibited the
electrical-field-induced ATP release, indicating that ATP efflux occurs via
anion channels.