BCL2L1 and breast cancer: The study also found significant downregulation in expression levels of anti-apoptotic proteins Bcl-xL and Mcl-1; significant reduction in the phosphorylation of ERK and Akt in MDA-MB-231 cells but an increased ERK phosphorylation in MCF-7 cells; additionally, a synergistic increase in intracellular ROS level of breast cancer cells and reduction in the level of intracellular glutathione (Zhang et al., 2013).