Abstract: Objective To explore the mechanism of the cell-cycle arrest induced by human melanoma differentiation associated gene-7 (mda-7/IL-24) in chronic myelocytic leukemia cell line K562. Methods Microarray analysis was performed to determine the genes that were differentially regulated by mda-7/IL-24 in K562 cells, and was validated by realtime PCR. The phosphorylated pRb were detected by Western blotting analysis. Results A microarray analysis showed that G_0/G_1 phase-associated genes p21~(WAF-1) and BCCIP were up-egulated, while cdk6 and Smurf2 were down-regulated. The directional change in the expression of the four genes was successfully validated with real-time quantitative RT-PCR. pRb Set~(795) phosphorylation was observed with no modification of the pRb protein level. Conclusion These results suggest that IL-24/mda-7 may inhibit K562 proliferation and induce G_0/G_1 cell cycle angst by up-regulating p21~(WAF-1) and BCCIP, down-regulating cdk6 and Smurf2.