Objective: To investigate the effect of the overexpression of vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 on the apoptosis of ovarian carcinoma cells. Methods: The lentiviral vector with full length VCAM-1 gene(GV358-VCAM1+) was constructed and transfected into human ovarian carcinoma cell line, IGROV1. The tumor cells with VCAM-1 stable overexpression were selected by puromycin. The transfection rate was determined via the observation of green fluorescence under an inverted fluorescence microscope.The levels of VCAM-1 protein and m RNA were identified by western blot and RT-PCR analysis, respectively. The cell apoptosis was analyzed by flow cytometry assay. Meanwhile, the expression level of apoptosis related proteins(Bcl-2, Bax, Casepase-3 and Cleaved Casepase-3), STAT3 and p-STAT3 protein, were detected by western blot analysis. Results: The transfection rate of GV358-VCAM1+in IGROV1 cells was more than 85%. These cells had stable VCAM-1 expression not only at the protein but also m RNA level. Tumor cells with VCAM-1 overexpression had significantly higher apoptosis than those with empty vector control group(P=0.0149). Moreover,compared with the empty vector control group, there were significantly higher expression of Bax, Casepase-3 and Cleaved Casepase-3(P0.01), and lower expression of Bcl-2 and p-STAT3 in VCAM-1 overexpression group(P0.01). However, the expression level of STAT3 was not significantly changed. Conclusion: VCAM-1 could induce the cell apoptosis of ovarian carcinoma through down-regulation of STAT3 phosphorylation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]