Saikosaponin-d Enhances the Anticancer Potency of TNF- via Overcoming Its Undesirable Response of Activating NF-Kappa B Signalling in Cancer Cells
Figure 1
Inducing effect of Ssd on the TNF-α-mediated cell death through potentiating the loss of mitochondrial membrane potential (ΔΨm). (a) Ssd increases the percentage of cancer cell death in the presence of TNF-α. HeLa and HepG2 cancer cells were treated with 10 μM of Ssd with or without 20 ng/mL TNF-α for 24 h. The LIVE/DEAD Cell Imaging Kit (Life Technologies) reagents were mixed and added to the cells for 15 min. The cells were subjected to fluorescence imaging using Olympus IX71-Applied Precision DeltaVision restoration microscope. Cells with green fluorescence signal represent live cells, while cells with red fluorescence signal represent dead cells. The percentage of dead cells was quantified for HeLa and HepG2 and indicated in bar chart. (b) Ssd enhances the (ΔΨm) loss in the presence of TNF-α. HeLa cells were treated with 10 μM of Ssd with or without 20 ng/mL TNF-α for 4 h, the cells were then stained with 2 μM of JC-1 for 30 min. Fluorescence images were captured using Olympus IX71-Applied Precision DeltaVision restoration microscope and the percentage of cells with (ΔΨm) loss was quantified and indicated in bar chart. Orange-fluorescent signal indicates the cells with hyperpolarized membrane potentials, while green-fluorescent signal indicates the cells with depolarized membrane potentials. ** and ***. Three independent experiments were performed, and more than 5000 cells were scored from 5 different views of captured images.
