Research Paper Volume 11, Issue 22 pp 10284—10300

Figure 3. Erianin inhibited HepG2-xenograft tumor growth in BALB/c nude mice. BALB/c athymic nude mice inoculated with HepG2 cells were treated with erianin (20 mg/kg dissolved in 0.9% saline solution containing 1:10,000 DMSO) or vehicle solvent (0.9% saline solution containing 1:10,000 DMSO) for 14 days. (A) Tumor-bearing nude mice and (B) tumors collected from vehicle and erianin-treated groups. (C) Tumor volumes were measured every other day. Tumor sizes are expressed as mean ± SD (n = 6). * P < 0.05, ** P < 0.01 vs control group. (D) Mean (±SD) body weights in the erianin-treated and vehicle groups (n = 6). Pathological analysis of (E) liver and (F) spleen tissues via H&E staining. (G) Erianin significantly enhanced the ratio of cleaved PARP/PARP, cleaved caspase-3/caspase-3, cleaved caspase-8/caspase-8 and cleaved caspase-9/caspase-9, and the expression levels of Bax, Bad, Bim and PUMA, and reduced the expression levels of Bcl-2 in tumor tissues. Quantitative protein expression data were normalized to GAPDH levels and/or related total protein levels in the corresponding samples. The marked average changes of proteins were expressed as folds relative to the corresponding control tumor tissues (n = 6).