Fig. 1

Effects of Sunitinib and HM-3 on experimental MDA-MB-231 cell metastasis. a Treatment protocol of BALB/c nude mice after MDA-MB-231-luc + cells were injected into the tail vein of the mice. b Quantification of bioluminescence at day 21 showed accelerated metastasis in groups 2 and 4 compared with the control group, whereas tumor burden was significantly decreased in groups 3 and 5. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01. c Representative images of bioluminescence for each group taken on days 1, 7, and 21 following tumor implantation. d Kaplan-Meier survival curves showed significantly decreased median survival of mice in groups 2 and 4 (log-rank test, p = 0.0216 and 0.0464) and significant increased median survival of mice in group 5 (p = 0.0183). For group 1–5, n = 9. e Representative examples of micrometastasis in lung by hematoxylin and eosin (H and E) staining (indicated by words in red) and anti-CD31 immunostaining (indicated by words in blue). f Statistical analysis of the blood vessel numbers. Results are expressed as mean ± SD (15 regions of three sections per group. *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01 vs. control)