Anti-cancer Activity of Boswellia Carterii Extract Alters the Stress Functional Gene Expression in the Pancreatic Cancer Cell

Abstract

Boswellia Carterii, a well-known plant species used in Korean medicine, is particularly effective in anti-cancer and inflammatory diseases. Its gum created from white resin is known to have therapeutic effects. However, the study on the anti-cancer pathway is very limited in human pancreatic cancer cells. thus, we investigated the changes in overall oncologic gene expression when treated BC in AsPC-1 cells. In this paper, we aimed to see how BC can be used to decrease cell viability with full explanation of gene expression in AsPC-1. We used MTT, microarray, and qRT-PCR to confirm our thesis. Results showed that BC inhibited cell viability in AsPC-1 by more than two-fold, which implies that BC has cell cytotoxic effects. Also, BC induced early and late apoptosis when treated for 24h on the pancreatic cancer cells. Differentially expressed genes were analyzed by microarray for demonstrated apoptotic effects at the mRNA level. The number of genes were related to participation in the oxidation-reduction process or signaling pathways. The signal pathway was verified by western blotting mainly STAT3 but also JAK, Src, ERK, JNK, and Akt. The results prove that stress signaling such as cytokines were regulated by BC stimulation. Therefore, our findings support the show that differentially expressed genes in BC-treated represent anti- cancer effects in pancreatic cancer and this has the potential for further understanding of the entire mechanism of cancer and its treatment.