FIGURE 1

Ai Du Qing formula (ADQ) exerts anti-cancer and chemosensitivity effects on breast cancer cells. (A) CCK8 assay demonstrated that ADQ (0–100 μg/ml) exerted an inhibitory effect on breast cancer cells MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7, while posing little cytotoxicity on non-malignant mammary epithelial cell lines HBL-100 and MCF-10A. (B) ADQ exerted an obvious inhibition on the colony formation abilities of breast cancer cell lines MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7 at different concentrations (0–100 μg/ml). (C) Cell counting assay showed a synergistic effect of ADQ (0–100 μg/ml) with 50 nM taxol in MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7 cells. (D) Drug efflux assay demonstrated that ADQ (50 μg/ml) could increase the intake of epirubicin (10 μg/ml) in MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7 cells based on flow cytometry and laser confocal. (E) Colony formation assay demonstrated synergistic effects of ADQ with taxol to suppress the colony size and number of MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7 cells. All values represent the means ± SD (n = 3, *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01 vs. Control group; ^#p < 0.05, ^##p < 0.01 vs. Taxol group).