Differentiation Paradigms and STAT Protein Expression in Neuro-2A Cells

Abstract

One of the most recent and exciting potential treatments for cancer is differentiation therapy which is inducing the differentiation of cancerous cells into normal functioning somatic cells. An excellent candidate for differentiation therapy is the neuroblastoma. The compounds examined in this experiment to induce differentiation in the N2A murine neuroblastoma cell line while performing morphometrics and western blot analysis in this project are: mevinolin, dibutyryl cAMP, all-trans-retinoic acid, ceramide, and perillyl alcohol. Morphometric study data: 12h study, perillyl alcohol exhibited the greatest differentiation at 63%; 24h study, perillyl alcohol exhibited the greatest again at 62%; 48h study, perillyl alcohol was again the highest differentiator, but this time at 68% differentiation. STAT proteins were found to be expressed in all treatments. Acetylcholinesterase was expressed in most of the treatments. NeuN was present in all treatments.