Abstract
Cisplatin is frequently used in treating gastric cancers; however, acquired resistance to the drug often reduces the efficacy of therapy. The present study analyzed the efficacy of the combination of 4-[4-(4-chloro-phenyl)-thiazol-2-ylamino]-phenol (SKI-II) and cisplatin [cis-diamminedichloroplatinum (II); DDP] on the gastric cancer SGC7901/DDP cell line. The results revealed that SKI-II and DDP had a clear synergistic effect. Glutathione (GSH) and glutathione S-transferase (GST) levels decreased significantly subsequent to the cells being treated with the combination of DDP and SKI-II compared with the cells that were treated with DDP or SKI-II alone. Phosphorylated extracellular-signal-regulated kinase (p-ERK) and phosphorylated c-Jun N-terminal kinase (p-JNK) expression levels also decreased following treatment with SKI-II. The results suggested that SKI-II is able to reverse the drug resistance in human gastric carcinoma cells and enhance the antitumor effect of DDP through the ras/mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) proliferation pathway.