Fig. 3. Effects of rapamycin, Torin 1, and AZD6738 on cell death induced by glucose withdrawn.

A, B Viability measurement of Coq7 KO cells by CV staining after 4-day culture in galactose medium in the presence of the tested compounds. CoQ₁₀ (10 µM) was included as a positive control. C Torin1 was ineffective to improve cell survival in glucose- and galactose-free medium. OSI-27 (5 µM) was included as a positive control. D Viability measurement of Coq7 KO cells by CV staining after 4-day culture in galactose medium in the presence of AZD6738. Error bar is SEM of 4 biological replicates. *p < 0.05, ****p < 0.0001, assessed by one-way ANOVA followed by Tukey’s multiple-comparison test. ns: not significant. E OSI-027 and AZ20 failed to rescue the death of Pdss2-Coq7 double-KO (DKO) cells in galactose medium. Shown are representative images taken 2 days after switching to galactose medium. CoQ₁₀ treatment, resulting in almost full rescue, was used as a positive control. The presence of OSI-027 (10 µM), AZ20 (20 µM), and rapamycin (1 µM) did not prevent the death of DKO cells in galactose medium. Scale bars = 100 µm.