Fluorinated rhodacyanines induce apoptosis via mitochondrial damage and cell cycle arrest

Rhodacyanine, a series of cyanines derived from rhodanine, exerts anticancer effects. This study intended to uncover the biological mechanism underlying the anticancer effects of a a fluorinated rhodacyanine in HeLa cervical cancer cells. Initially, the cytotoxic activities of 15 compounds were screened, Rho-7 exhibited the most effective compound against Hela cell growth with IC50 values at 0.03 µM. Interestingly, Rho-7-targeted mitochondrial damage leads to cancer cell death by increasing reactive oxygen species (ROS) levels. Additionally, Rho-7 can trigger Hela cells to undergo apoptosis and cell cycle arrest at the G2/M phase. Rho-7 could downregulate the expression of anti-apoptotic Mcl-1 genes or upregulate the level of pro-apoptotic Bad and Bik genes. Our findings suggest that the anticancer activity of Rho-7 involve ROS generation, cell cycle arrest and apoptotic induction, as well as alteration of pro-and anti-apoptotic genes, displaying a therapeutic potential of Rho-7 in cervical cancer treatment. Overall design: In this study, transcriptomics were used to identify the gene expression profiling of the Hela cells.Technical and biological normalization of the raw counts of each gene was performed using transcriptomics. Technical normalization, a positive control factor was calculated for each sample.