Fig 6. Effect of miR-17 family on cell growth, colony formation and apoptosis of LNCaP cells.

LNCaP cells were transfected either with control vector or miRNA expression vectors and seeded in a limited cell number. Cell growth was determined by automated cell counting of parallel experiments at 24, 48 and 72 h post transfection for three independent experiments (A). Eight days after seeding, colonies were stained with crystal violet (B). Colony formation was quantified by densitometry analyses. Data show the mean and ± SEM of the densitometry analysis of three independent CFA experiments (***, p<0.001). For apoptosis analysis, LNCaP cells were harvested 72h post transfection and stained with Annexin-FITC/PI. In FACS analysis apoptosis was determined as sum of early and late apoptosis (upper/lower right quadrants). Dot blots display representative results (FL1-H: Annexin-FITC, FL3-H: PI), the right panel shows the mean of four independent experiments (C).