Fig 1: Knockdown of LINC00942 promotes cell cycle arrest and apoptosis in HCC cells. a, c Flow cytometric analysis was conducted to assess the cell cycle distribution between the sh-NC and sh-LINC00942 groups in the HepG2 and Huh7 cell lines. b, d A quantitative analysis was performed to determine the proportion of cells in each phase of the cell cycle. e, g Flow cytometric analysis was also utilized to evaluate apoptosis in the sh-NC and sh-LINC00942 groups within the HepG2 and Huh7 cell lines. f, h A quantitative assessment of the cellular distribution across different apoptotic stages was carried out, where Q2 indicates late apoptotic cells and Q3 denotes early apoptotic cells. i Western blot analysis was performed with triplicate biological replicates to detect the expression levels of apoptosis-related proteins, including Bad, Bax, Bcl-2, and active caspase-3. j Western blot analysis was conducted with triplicate biological replicates to examine the expression of other apoptosis-related proteins, specifically CDK2, CDK6, Cyclin D1, and Cyclin B1. k After LINC00942 knockout, CDK2, Cyclin D1, and Cyclin B1 were significantly downregulated. l After LINC00942 knockout, BAD, BAX and active caspase-3 were significantly upregulated. Data were analyzed using one-way ANOVA