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Updated: May 25, 2026

Translationally-Relevant Tumor Resection Model for Murine Preclinical Models of Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma
Published on: April 3, 2026
Reversine suppresses oral squamous cell carcinoma via cell cycle arrest and concomitantly apoptosis and autophagy
Ying-Ray Lee1, Wei-Ching Wu, Wen-Tsai Ji
1Department of Medical Research, Chiayi Christian Hospital, Chia-Yi, Taiwan.
Background:
The effective therapies for oral cancer patients of stage III and IV are generally surgical excision and radiation combined with adjuvant chemotherapy using 5-Fu and Cisplatin. However, the five-year survival rate is still less than 30% in Taiwan. Therefore, evaluation of effective drugs for oral cancer treatment is an important issue. Many studies indicated that aurora kinases (A, B and C) were potential targets for cancer therapies. Reversine was proved to be a novel aurora kinases inhibitor with lower toxicity recently. In this study, the potentiality for reversine as an anticancer agent in oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) was evaluated.
Methods:
Effects of reversine on cell growth, cell cycle progress, apoptosis, and autophagy were evaluated mainly by cell counting, flow cytometry, immunoblot, and immunofluorescence.
Results:
The results demonstrated that reversine significantly suppressed the proliferation of two OSCC cell lines (OC2 and OCSL) and markedly rendered cell cycle arrest at G2/M stage. Reversine also induced cell death via both caspase-dependent and -independent apoptosis. In addition, reversine could inhibit Akt/mTORC1 signaling pathway, accounting for its ability to induce autophagy.
Conclusions:
Taken together, reversine suppresses growth of OSCC via multiple mechanisms, which may be a unique advantage for developing novel therapeutic regimens for treatment of oral cancer in the future.
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