These results were confirmed by an assessment of apoptosis-related proteins, which showed that combined treatment with HS-173 and radiation increased the levels of cleaved caspase-3 and cleaved PARP, but decreased the expression levels of the anti-apoptotic survivin compared with radiation alone, demonstrating that the HS-173-induced increase in radiosensitivity resulted in an increase in apoptosis in pancreatic cancer cells. The gene discussed is CASP3; the disease is familial pancreatic carcinoma.