Fig. 5

Effect of the 3D BM niche-like AML model on KG1a cell proliferation, ALDH expression, and drug resistance. (A, B) Effect of different cell culture conditions on KG1a cell proliferation. “*” highlights two populations of cells. (C, D) Changes in the ALDH-positive population level under different culture conditions. (E) An analysis of cell viability under different culture conditions after treatment with DNR. KG1a cells in the 3D BM niche-like AML model demonstrated a significant increase in drug resistance compared to other culture conditions (***p < 0.001; **p < 0.01; *p < 0.05). (F) A schematic illustration of the experimental procedure used for the in vivo assay. KG1a cells were transplanted into busulfan-treated NSG mice to generate AML. Eleven days later, the mice were treated with DNR daily for seven days. Five weeks later, cells were isolated from the BM and stained for the expression of human and mouse CD45. The illustration was created with BioRender.com. DNR reduced the BM engraftment of AML cells to various degrees. The graph represents the percentage of CD45 + human AML cells in BM samples collected from AML mice (n = 3) five weeks after DNR treatment. The percent engraftment of three DNR-treated mice compared to untreated control (KG1a) is shown