Figure 6.

Effect of a Bcl-2 knockdown on eribulin- and paclitaxel-induced cell death and cell cycle progression. (a) Western blot analyses for the status of the indicated proteins in MCF-7 and MCF-7/Casp3 cells treated for 24 and 48 h with 10 nM eribulin or 30 nM paclitaxel in the presence of a control siRNA or the Bcl-2 siRNA. Blots shown are representative blots of five independent experiments. (b) Fluorometric determination of caspase-3-like DEVDase activities in MCF-7/Casp3 cells treated as described in (a). (c, d) Cytometric determination of death rates (PI uptake) of MCF-7 (c) and MCF-7/Casp3 cells (d) treated for 72 h as described in (a). Values shown are the mean of four (b) or of three to four (c-d) independent experiments ± S.D. (e-g) MCF-7 cells were either left untreated (control) or were treated for 16 h with 10 nM eribulin or 30 nM paclitaxel in the presence of a control siRNA or the Bcl-2 siRNA followed by cytometric determination of cells in G1, S, and G2/M phase. Values shown are the mean of three independent experiments ± S.D.