Fig. 5

DEH induces ER stress in colorectal cancer cells. a Gene set enrichment analysis of UPR genes between control and DEH-treated cells. b The thermodynamic chart of the mRNA expression level of genes related to ER stress in colorectal carcinoma cells after incubation with DEH for 48 h. c The subcellular structure of colorectal cancer cells after treatment with or without 60 μM DEH for 48 h were observed by TEM. Scale bar: 2 μm. N: nucleus. The ER is circled in red. d Western blotting assays were performed to detect the expression of BiP, Ero1-Lα, PERK, eIF2α, p-eIF2α, IRE1α, XBP-1 s, CHOP, and Tubulin in HCT 116 and SW620 cells after treatment with or without DEH. The densitometry of western blotting in the right panel. The data were presented as means ±SD. All the data were analyzed by the Unpaired Student’s t-test and p-values less than 0.05 were considered to be statistically significant. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001