Fig. 4

Assessment of apoptosis induced by BT-cisplatin combination on ovarian cancer cell lines. The effect of BT-cisplatin combination on caspase 3/7 activity was measured in A2780 and A2780-CDDP (a) or IGROV-1 and IGROV-1-CDDP (b) cells treated with BT or cisplatin alone or in combination. Vehicle-treated cells were considered as control against which treated cells were compared. Data were expressed as means ± SD of triplicate experiments. Comparisons between cisplatin alone-treated and combination-treated for each cell line were performed using Student’s t–test. Asterisks (*) indicate p < 0.05. c and d Effect of BT/cisplatin combinations on Pro-apoptotic (cPARP), anti-apoptotic (XIAP, bcl-2, bcl-xL) and cell cycle regulatory markers were assessed. Analysis of the expression of proteins in the lysates of treated and untreated A2780 and A2780-CDDP (c) or IGROV-1 and IGROV-1-CDDP (d) cells was carried out by PAGE and western blot analysis. The blots were probed with the respective primary antibodies. As an internal standard for equal loading, blots were probed with an anti-β-actin antibody