B89
Selective killing of cancer cells and drug modulation by plant components for better cancer medicine
Kamaljit Kaur1, Nashi Widodo2, Saroj Arora3, Renu Wadhwa4, Sunil Kaul4
1Khalsa College, Amritsar, Punjab, India, 2Brawijaya University, Malang, Indonesia, 3Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, Punjab, India, 4National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science & Technology (AIST), Tsukuba, Japan
Aim
Conventional chemotherapy for treatment of cancer, although very effective, has been associated with toxicities to normal cells, and hence, can cause unwanted side effects. Medicinal plants have been primary source of highly effective conventional drugs for the treatment of many forms of cancer. With an aim to identify the selective killing agents from medicinal plants, in the present investigation, we screened the components from some plants and studied their molecular mechanisms to develop an effective and safe anticancer drug with minimized side effects.
Method
Selective anticancer activity of the medicinal plant extracts was identified by in vitro growth assays of human normal (TIG 1, MRC-5) and transformed (MCF-7, U20S) cell lines. To investigate the effects of Lash on cell viability alone or in combination with drugs, WST1 assay was used, which is based on cleavage of tertrazolium salt WST-1 by mitochondrial dehydrogenases in viable cells leading to formazan formation.
Results
We found that out of the extracts obtained from the three medicinal plants, only leaf extract of Withania somnifera has cytotoxic activity for a large variety of human cancer cells and does not affect normal cells that operate through p53-dependent and independent pathways. The extracts from other medicinal plants did not show such selective killing activity for cancer cells. The molecular mechanism(s) for cancer cell killing was investigated by gene-silencing approach. We also attempted to employ selective killing of cancer cells by Leaf extract of W. somnifera, in combination with three well-known conventional antitumour drugs (Etoposide, Doxorubicin and 5-Fluorouracil) to design a combinatorial less toxic and more effective therapy. We report that the selective killing of leaf extract of W. somnifera can be employed in combination with anticancer drugs to yield an effective combinatorial anticancer formulation.
Conclusion
We suggest that W. somnifera is a natural source for safe anticancer medicine and effective in designing a combinatorial therapy that was more effective for cancer cells and is safer for normal cells.
