Alpha-trifluoromethylated acyloins induce apoptosis in human oral tumor cell lines

Cytotoxic activity of newly synthesized trifluoromethyl ketones and related compounds was studied using two human oral tumor cell lines (HSG and HSC-2). Among them, alpha-trifluoromethylacyloins (1 and 2) were found to induce apoptotic cell death, as judged by the terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT) dUTP nick end-labeling (TUNEL) method which detects DNA nick or fragments. Furthermore, the cytoplasm of 1 or 2 treated HSG cells was stained by M30 monoclonal antibody, which detects the product resulting from the cleavage of cytokeratin 18 by activated caspase.