Abstract
BackgroundTriple-negative breast cancer is a biological subtype of breast cancer, which is unresponsive to conventional chemotherapies and has a poor prognosis. C-Phycocyanin (C-PC), a marine natural purified from Spirulina platensis, has been investigated that has anti-cancer function. The mitogen activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway plays a crucial role in the development and progression of cancer. Therefore, we would like to study the anti-cancer effects of C-phycocyanin in the treatment of triple-negative breast cancer, and explore the role of MAPK pathway in the anti-tumor effects of C-phycocyanin.MethodsCell proliferation, cell cycle, cell apoptosis and cell migration were explored in breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cell lines. AKT, MAPK and membrane death receptor signaling were evaluated in MDA-MB-231 cell lines.ResultsOur study indicated that C-phycocyanin inhibited cell proliferation and reduced colony formation ability of MDA-MB-231 cells. Furthermore, C-phycocyanin induced cell cycle G0/G1 arrest by decreasing protein expression levels of Cyclin D1 and CDK-2 and increasing protein expression levels of p21 and p27. In addition, C-phycocyanin induced cell apoptotic by activating cell membrane surface death receptor pathway. Besides, C-phycocyanin down-regulated the protein expression levels of cyclooxygenase-2, and further inhibited MDA-MB-231 cells migration. We also found cell death induced by C-phycocyanin was carried through the MAPK signaling pathways. C-Phycocyanin was able to induce MDA-MB-231 cell apoptosis by activating p38 MAPK and JNK signaling pathways while inhibiting ERK pathway.ConclusionsC-Phycocyanin exerted anti-cancer activity via the MAPK signaling pathway in MDA-MB-231 cells.
Highlights
The most common diagnosed cancer for women is breast cancer, it has a high mortality rate in cancer worldwide for women
When MDA-MB-231 cells were treated with C-phycocyanin, we observed a change in cell growth state that the cell morphology changed from long spindle-shaped to shorter spindle-shaped and flatter appearance
The clonogenic assay showed that the colony formation was significant reduced when MDA-MB-231 cells were treated with C-phycocyanin, and the colony formation was reduced in a dose-dependent manner in MDA-MB-231 cell line (Fig. 1c)
Summary
The most common diagnosed cancer for women is breast cancer, it has a high mortality rate in cancer worldwide for women. In the world, it was an estimated 1.7 million cases of breast cancer, and the number of deaths was 521,900 cases in 2012. The triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is a common biological subtype of breast cancer and the pathologic features are the progesterone receptor (PR)-negative, the estrogen receptor (ER)-negative and the HER2-negative [3, 4]. We would like to study the anti-cancer effects of C-phycocyanin in the treatment of triple-negative breast cancer, and explore the role of MAPK pathway in the anti-tumor effects of C-phycocyanin
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