Assessing cellular DNA damage from the helium plasma needle

The aim of the presents study is determining the DNA damage by cell exposure to atmospheric pressure non-thermal plasma. Mouse leukocytes embedded in agarose have been subjected to plasma at two different distances from a helium plasma needle outlet and during three different exposure periods. The possible damage has been assessed by means of a single cell gel electrophoresis assay. The results indicated that, at 0.1 cm from the plasma needle, the exposure caused complete DNA fragmentation, confirmed by the presents of so-called `clouds´. With 0.5 cm between the plasma outlet and the slide surface samples presented damages closely proportional to the treatments periods in terms of tail intensity, tail moment and `cloud´ frequency. This enables us to conclude that, within the parametric values of the experiment, a plasma needle can cause DNA damage in mice leukocites proportionally to the exposure periods..