Figure 2.

(a) Cellular accumulation of Zn and Cd is boosted by heat shock. After addition of Zn and Cd to final concentration of 100 and 60 uM, respectively, with or without heat shock (42°C for 1 h). HEK293 cells were harvested and analyzed by ICP-MS. The data from three independent determinations has been shown [101]. (b) Expression of HSP70 promoter by Cd and heat in presence or absence of HSF-1. HEK293 cells were transfected with HSP70-Luc promoter-reporter construct, the CMV-LacZ reference construct, and mouse HSF-1 expression vector. 36 h after transfection, cells were treated with 100 μM ZnCl₂ or 60 μM CdCl₂ with or without heat shock at 43°C for 1 h. The cells were collected and reporter gene activities were determined by luciferase assay. The basal level was taken as 1 to calculate the fold activation [101].