Shikonin is one of the main active ingredient of traditional chinese medicines Recently, some studies indicate that shikonin has potential anti-tumor effects by inducing programmed cell death, inhibition of cancer cell proliferation, anti-angiogenesis, and shikonin also circumvents cancer drug resistance by inducing necroptotic death.53-57 In the current study, we found that shikonin induced programmed cell death in colorectal carcinoma cells by activating the expression and dimerization of Galectin-1. This evidence concerns the gene LGALS1 and neoplasm.