Basic Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2021. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastrointest Oncol. Aug 15, 2021; 13(8): 893-914
Published online Aug 15, 2021. doi: 10.4251/wjgo.v13.i8.893
STAT3-mediated activation of mitochondrial pathway contributes to antitumor effect of dihydrotanshinone I in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma cells
Ming-Ming Qi, Peng-Zhan He, Lan Zhang, Wei-Guo Dong
Ming-Ming Qi, Peng-Zhan He, Lan Zhang, Wei-Guo Dong, Department of Gastroenterology, Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University, Wuhan 430060, Hubei Province, China
Ming-Ming Qi, Peng-Zhan He, Lan Zhang, Central Laboratory of Renmin Hospital, Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University, Wuhan 430060, Hubei Province, China
Author contributions: Qi MM and Dong WG designed the research; Qi MM and He PZ performed the research; Zhang L contributed new reagents/analytical tools; Qi MM and He PZ analyzed the data; Qi MM wrote the manuscript; all authors have read and approved the final manuscript.
Supported by The National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 81572426, No. 81870392, and No. 82000521.
Institutional review board statement: The Ethics Committee of Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University approved all procedures involving animals (WDRM#20181114).
Institutional animal care and use committee statement: All animal experiments were carried out in accordance with the National Institutes of Health Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (NIH Publications No. 8023, revised in 1978).
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no conflicts of interest for this manuscript.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
ARRIVE guidelines statement: The authors have read the ARRIVE Guidelines, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the ARRIVE Guidelines.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Wei-Guo Dong, MD, PhD, Professor, Department of Gastroenterology, Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University, No. 238 Jiefang Road, Wuhan 430060, Hubei Province, China. dongweiguo@whu.edu.cn
Received: May 20, 2021
Peer-review started: May 20, 2021
First decision: June 12, 2021
Revised: June 17, 2021
Accepted: July 5, 2021
Article in press: July 5, 2021
Published online: August 15, 2021
Processing time: 86 Days and 2.6 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is one of the most common malignancies with a poor prognosis. Our research found that dihydrotanshinone I (DHTS) suppresses proliferation and induces apoptosis in ESCC cells. Besides, STAT3-mediated activation of the mitochondrial pathway plays a vital role in DHTS-induced apoptosis. DHTS may be a promising candidate for the treatment of ESCC.