It should be emphasized that compounds ZKKs induced apoptosis in the K-562 cells derived

from a woman with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) in blast crisis (Lozzio and Lozzio, 1975; McGahon et al., 1994). The K-562 cells carry the Philadelphia (Ph) chromosome (Lozzio and Lozzio, 1975). The result of this chromosomal translocation is formation of the oncogenic Bcr-Abl fusion gene that is constitutively active. The product of the Bcr-Abl gene is a protein Selleck JPH203 with tyrosine kinase activity. Bcr-Abl-expressing leukemic cells show resistance to apoptosis induced by chemotherapeutic drugs (McGahon et al., 1994), which seems to be related to overexpression of the antiapoptotic protein Bcl-xL (Horita et al., 2000). In general, K562 cells are highly resistant to multiple anticancer agents and easily transform to 17DMAG drug-resistant lines during treatment by novel drugs (McGahon et al., 1994; Bedi et al., 1995; Amarante-Mendes et al., 1998). Concluding remarks Our results suggest that N-substituted selleck screening library pentabromobenzylisothioureas might be promising anticancer agents. The study on anticancer activity of this compound class in solid tumors is in progress, and further investigations are needed to evaluate their clinical potential. Acknowledgment

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