Fig. 5

CpG 685 promotes the apoptosis in primary Ph⁻ B-ALL cells with C-MYC overexpression and without BAX deletion. A Real-time RT-PCR results of c-myc expression profile in PBMC from 14 B-ALL patients and 3 healthy controls and normalized to the expression of β-actin (up penal). Viable B-ALL cell number in B-ALL cells from these patients cultured in media with or without 5 μg/ml CpG 685 at day 3 of culture were determined by annexin-V/7AAD staining. Viable B-ALL cell number was calculated and ordered by the levels of c-myc expression (down penal). B Using the c-myc expression level in PBMC of healthy control as the reference, B-ALL patients were divided into c-myc high expression group and c-myc low expression group. Results found that CpG 685 can reduce the viable B-ALL cells in the c-myc high expression group according to the two-tailed paired t-test. (p = 0.02). C Annexin-V/7AAD staining of B-ALL cells in patients with high expression of c-myc, CpG 685 can significantly promote the apoptosis of B-ALL cells. D The percentage of Annexin-V⁺ B-ALL cells (fold) from 2 patients with high expression of c-myc treated with or without CpG 685 after 3 day was analyzed by flow cytometry. Columns represent means of 3 independent experiments; bars represent SEM