Tropical Journal of Pharmaceutical Research

Original Research Article | OPEN ACCESS

Gentiopicrin exerts anticancer effect on human colon cancer cells via caspase-dependent apoptosis, cell cycle arrest, and inhibition of cell migration and invasion

Zheng Zhang¹, Shaoyu Zhang¹, Chenyuan Yu²

¹Department of Gastroenterology, Baoji Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine; ²Department of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Baoji People's Hospital, Baoji, Shaanxi 721000, China.

For correspondence:- Chenyuan Yu Email: baojiyixue@163.com Tel:+8613809178794

Accepted: 22 July 2021 Published: 31 August 2021

Citation: Zhang Z, Zhang S, Yu C. Gentiopicrin exerts anticancer effect on human colon cancer cells via caspase-dependent apoptosis, cell cycle arrest, and inhibition of cell migration and invasion. Trop J Pharm Res 2021; 20(8):1593-1599 doi: 10.4314/tjpr.v20i8.7

© 2021 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

Purpose: To investigate the anticancer effect of gentiopicrin on human colon cancer (HT-295) cells, and its effects on caspase-mediated cellular apoptosis, cell cycle, cell migration and cell invasion.

Methods: MTT assay and clonogenic assay were used to study the effect of gentiopicrin on cell viability and cancer colony formation, respectively, while the apoptotic effects of gentiopicrin were determined using fluorescence microscopy and Western blotting. The effect of gentiopicrin on cell cycle was evaluated by flow cytometry, while Transwell assay was used to study its effects on cell migration and invasion.

Results: Gentiopicrin exerted potent and dose-dependent suppression of cell proliferation and colony formation, and produced pro-apoptotic effects on HT-295 colon cancer cells. Treatment of HT-295 cells with gentiopicrin resulted in up-regulated expressions of caspase-3, caspase-8, caspase-9 and Bax, while Bcl-2 expression was downregulated. Moreover, gentiopicrin dose-dependently induced cell cycle arrest in HT-295 cells at the G2/M phase, and inhibited cell migration and invasion.

Conclusion: Gentiopicrin exerts potent anticancer effects on human colon cancer cells via cell apoptosis and G2/M phase cell cycle arrest. In addition, it suppressed the migration and invasion of HT-295 cells. These findings provide useful basis for further in vivo research of gentiopicrin on colon cancer.

Keywords: Colon cancer, Glycosides, Gentiopicrin, Caspase, Apoptosis, Cell cycle