Fig. 5

Inhibition of autophagy resensitizes resistant cells to 5-FU. a All cell lines were subjected to co-treatment with 5-FU (1 μg/ml) and chloroquine (CQ) (10 μM) for 72 h. Reduction in cell viability (%) relative to untreated cells was measured by MTS assay. Experiments were performed at least three times, representative data are shown. Error bars represent SD. Statistically significant difference between treatment with CQ alone and co-treatment (5-FU and CQ) is indicated by *. P < 0.01. b All cell lines were subjected to immunoblotting to detect total levels of LC3B-I and LC3B-II, following treatment with CQ (50 μM) for 24 h. The experiment was repeated twice. The intensity of bands from CQ-treated cells are quantified relative to loading control bands, with the intensity level in Nt set to 1. c RNA levels (relative quantity) of MAP1LC3A and MAP1LC3B in all cell lines, as measured by RT-qPCR. Error bars represent standard deviation. Statistically significant difference between 5-FU sensitive and 5-FU resistant lines (P < 0.05) is indicated by *