Journal: Journal of Pharmaceutical Analysis

Article Title: Oblique-incidence reflectivity difference technology identifies the antiviral drug Ribavirin as an inhibitor of lung tumor progression by targeting AMPK signaling

doi: 10.1016/j.jpha.2025.101306

Figure Lengend Snippet: Ribavirin has synergistic effects on 5′-adenosine monophosphate (AMP)-activated protein kinase (AMPK) downregulation. (A) Three AMPK-targeting short hairpin RNAs (shRNAs) were screened to evaluate their knockdown efficiency and suppress AMPK expression in lung cancer cells. The data shown are representative of n = 3 biological replicates. (B) Tumor anatomy of mouse Lewis lung carcinoma (LLC) cells subcutaneous tumor-bearing mice in different treatment groups. (C) Tumor volume of LLC subcutaneous tumor-bearing mice in different treatment groups. Statistical significance between datasets was assessed by one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), followed by Tukey’s multiple comparisons post hoc test between all groups. The values are the means ± standard error of the mean (SEM); n = 8 mice per group, with differences denoted by ∗ P < 0.05 and ∗∗ P < 0.01. (D) Tumor weights of LLC subcutaneous tumor-bearing mice in different treatment groups. Statistical significance between datasets was assessed by one-way ANOVA, followed by Tukey’s multiple comparisons post hoc test between all groups. The values are the means ± SEM; n = 8 mice per group, with differences denoted by ∗ P < 0.05, ∗∗ P < 0.01, and ∗∗∗ P < 0.001. (E) Schematic illustration of the mechanism by which Ribavirin regulates AMPK activation. AMPK is phosphorylated in response to an increased AMP/adenosine triphosphate (ATP) or adenosine diphosphate (ADP)/ATP ratio, influencing cell growth and proliferation by inactivating mechanistic target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1). Ribavirin exerts its regulatory effect by inhibiting AMPK phosphorylation. Created with www.BioRender.com . shControl: non-targeting control short hairpin RNA; shAMPKα: AMPKα-targeting short hairpin RNA; GAPDH: glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase; PBS: phosphate buffered saline; mTOR: mechanistic target of rapamycin; Raptor: regulatory-associated protein of mTOR; Deptor: DEP domain-containing mTOR-interacting protein; PRAS40: proline-rich Akt substrate of 40 kDa; mLST8: mammalian lethal with SEC13 protein 8; 4EBP1:eukaryotic translation initiation factor 4E-binding protein 1; P: phosphorylation.

Article Snippet: The mice were randomly divided into four groups ( n = 8): the non-targeting control short hairpin RNA (shControl)-LLC + phosphate buffered saline (PBS) (Sangon Biotech, Shanghai, China) group, shControl-LLC + Ribavirin group, shAMPKα-LLC + PBS group, and shAMPKα-LLC + Ribavirin group.

Techniques: Knockdown, Expressing, Activation Assay, Phospho-proteomics, Control, shRNA, Saline, Binding Assay