CASP9 and hepatocellular carcinoma: Zhang et al[7] demonstrated that NCTD caused the liberation of cytochrome c and the activation of activator caspase-9 in a Bax- and Bak-dependent manner, which is mainly mediated through the suppression of Mcl-1, thereby increasing the effectiveness of ABT-737-induced apoptosis in 4 hepatocellular cancer (HCC) cell lines.