OBJECTIVETo investigate the effect of atorvastatin on proliferation and apoptosis of leukemia cell line HL-60 and its mechanism of signal pathway.

METHODSThe leukemia HL-60 cells in logarithmic growth phase were seeded in 96 well plates and were treated with 1, 5 and 10 mol/L atorvastatin, then were cultured in the incubator (at 37 °C, 5% CO) for 12 h, 24 h, 48 h. MTT colorimetric method was used to detect the proliferation leukemia cells, the apoptosis of leukemia cells was detected by flow cytometry; the expresion levels of phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase(PI3K), serine threonine protein kinase(ATK) and mTOR at mRNA and protein levels were detected by RT-PCR and Western blot respectively. The experiments included blank control group, the negative control group and drug-treated group.

RESULTSAtorvastatin could inhibit the proliferation of HL-60 cells. The treatment of HL-60 cells with 10 mol/L atorvastatin for 48 hours showed the strongest inhibition rate (39.78±3.00)% which was statistically significant different from negative control group (t=4.015, P<0.05) and the strongest induction-apoptosis effect on HL-60 cells (43.30±3.92)%, that was statistically significantly different from negative control group (t=3.624, P<0.05). After treatment with atorvastatin for 48 hours, the expression levels of PI3K,ATK and mTOR were decreased, in which the effect of 10 mol/L atorvastatin was the most obvious; The expression levels of PI3K,ATK and mTOR were decreased by (37.04±4.15)%, (53.81±3.25)% and (40.62±2.41) respectively, significantly different from the negative control (t=4.806,3.800,4.313, P<0.05).

CONCLUSIONAtorvastatin may inhibit the proliferation of HL-60 cells and induce apoptosis by inhibiting the PI3K/ATK/mTOR signaling pathway.