Abstract: AIM　To study the effect of lidamycin on the expression of genes involved in invasion regulation in HCT-8 human colon cancer cells. METHODS　HCT-8 human colon cancer cells were treated with lidamycin (10 nmol·L^-1) for 8 h. The effect of lidamycin on the expression of genes were detected by cDNA arrays, Northern blot and RT-PCR. RESULTS　Hybridization of the entire cDNA populations to Atlas Arrays showed that lidamycin down-regulated the expression level of MMP-9 and up-regulated the expression level of TIMP-1. These changes were confirmed by Northern blot and RT-PCR. CONCLUSION　The results indicate that lidamycin may exhibit its anti-invasive activity by inhibitting the production of type IV collagenase whilst enhancing the production of tissue inhibitor metalloproteinase.