Tropical Journal of Pharmaceutical Research

Review Article | OPEN ACCESS

Moringa oleifera: An apoptosis inducer in cancer cells

Ismail Abiola Adebayo, Wasiu Gbolahan Balogun, Hasni Arsad

Advanced Medical and Dental Institute, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Bertam, 13200 Kepala Batas, Pulau Pinang, Malaysia;

For correspondence:- Hasni Arsad Email: hasniarsad@usm.my

Accepted: 17 Oct 2016 Published: 30 September 2017

Citation: Adebayo IA, Balogun WG, Arsad H. Moringa oleifera: An apoptosis inducer in cancer cells. Trop J Pharm Res 2017; 16(9):2289-2296 doi: 10.4314/tjpr.v16i9.34

© 2017 The authors.
This is an Open Access article that uses a funding model which does not charge readers or their institutions for access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) and the Budapest Open Access Initiative (http://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/read), which permit unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited..

Abstract

Moringa oleifera, usually called “wonderful tree”, has been scientifically proven to inhibit proliferation of many cancer cell types by induction of apoptosis. Apoptosis is an energy dependent process, whereby cells due for death as a result of abnormal gene mutation, ageing among others commit suicide. It is referred to as hallmark of cancer. Proliferation of cancer cells is not unconnected to deficiency in their apoptotic process such as loss of caspase activity, p53 gene mutation and imbalanced regulation of Bcl2 proteins which leads to inactivation or reduction in cancer cell apoptosis, hence, agents that are capable of inducing apoptosis in cancer cells are potential sources of effective anticancer drug. The ability of M. oleifera to trigger apoptosis in cancer cells largely depends on its phytochemicals, most especially antioxidant phenols such as gallic acid, chlorogenic acid, rutin, apigenin, astragalin, quercetin, and kampferol. These compounds act by activating pro-apoptotic protein such as caspases, TRAIL, bax, bad, and inhibiting activity of anti-apoptotic proteins like Bcl2, IAPs (inhibitor of apoptosis), FLIP. In this review, we discussed cell apoptosis and its pathways, dysregulation of apoptosis in cancer cells, and more importantly, induction of apoptosis in cancer cells by Moringa oleifera tree.

Keywords: Apoptosis, cancer cells, Moringa oleifera