Fig. 3
From: Melittin-MIL-2 fusion protein as a candidate for cancer immunotherapy
The melittin-MIL-2 inhibited proliferation of human tumor cells. PBS was used as negative control in all cancer cell proliferation experiments. Cell proliferation was determined by the MTT assay. a To observe the dose-dependent inhibition of cancer cell proliferation, SMMC-7721 hepatocellular carcinoma cells (2 × 104) were incubated with increasing concentrations of melittin-MIL-2. Cell proliferation was determined in hexaplicates after 3 days. b To assess the growth inhibition of cancer cell lines from different tissue origins, liver cancer cells (SMMC-7721), mammary cancer cells (MDA-MB-231), ovary cancer cells (SKOV3), gastric cancer cells (SGC-7901) and lung cancer cells (A549) were used. We plated cancer cells in 96-well plates (2000 cells/well) and added the melittin-MIL-2 (100 μg/ml) at the beginning of the incubation. The indicated cancer cells were incubated for 3 days with melittin-MIL-2 and cell proliferation was determined (*p < 0.05). c The melittin-MIL-2 inhibited cell proliferation of ovarian cancer cells SKOV3 in a concentration-dependent manner; rIL-2 did not inhibit cell proliferation of SKOV3. The most effective inhibitory melittin-MIL-2 concentration was 4 μM, causing growth inhibition of 74 % (*p < 0.05)