Figure 1.

The expression of miR-218 in cervical cancer. (A) high level of miR-218 predicted cellular sensitivity to radiation in primary cultured cervical cancer samples (R²=0.6471, P<0.001).Upregulation of miR-218 sensitized cervical cancer cells to radiotherapy; (B) compared to normal cervix tissues, miR-218 was downregulated in human cervical cancer samples (P<0.001), and the miR-218 level was significantly low in the four human cervical cancer cell lines; (C) by transient transfection, the level of miR-218 was upregulated significantly in the four cells lines; (D) 48 hours after miR-218 transfection, we also detected notably decline of the Rictor protein (a direct target of miR-218); (E-H) upregulation of miR-218 markedly increased cellular sensitivity to the X-ray radiation especially in the 4 Gy group (P<0.001 for HeLa, P=0.009 for SiHa, P=0.016 for C33A and P=0.01 for CaSki).