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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2011 Feb 1.
Published in final edited form as: Clin Cancer Res. 2010 Jul 2;16(16):4217–4225. doi: 10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-10-0777

Fig. 3. Mechanism of cell death induced by ABT-737 and ABT-263.

Fig. 3

A, purified CLL cells were incubated with 10 or 100 nM ABT-737 or ABT-263 for 2 or 4 h before analysis of caspase-3 cleavage by western blotting. α–Tubulin was used as a loading control. B, CLL cells were incubated with 10 or 100 nM ABT-737 or ABT-263 for 4 h before staining with 50 nM TMRE and analysis of the loss of mitochondrial membrane potential (n=3, * P<0.05). C, CLL cells were incubated with 10 or 100 nM ABT-737 or ABT-263 before immunoprecipitation (IP) of BCL2. Binding of BAK was detected by Western blotting. D-E, CLL cells were exposed to 100 nM ABT-263 for 4 h before electron microscopy. D, low power magnification shows apoptotic nuclear morphology, with condensed chromatin and disintegration of nucleoli, in CLL cells exposed to ABT-263 (bar=2 μm). E, high power magnification shows swollen mitochondria and breaks in the outer mitochondrial membrane (bar=100 nm). The morphology resembles that previously described for ABT-737. F, murine embryonic fibroblasts (wt or Bax/Bak double knockout) were exposed to different concentrations of ABT-263 for 48 h and apoptosis was assessed by externalization of phosphatidylserine (PS) and staining with AnnexinV-FITC.