Abstract
Natural products have proved to be a promising source for the development of potential anticancer drugs. Emodin, a natural compound from Rheum palmatum, is used to treat several types of cancers, including lung, liver, and pancreatic. However, there are few reports regarding its use in the treatment of breast cancer. Thus, the therapeutic effect and mechanism of emodin on MCF-7 human breast cancer cells were investigated in this study. Morphological observations and cell viability were evaluated to determine the anti-proliferation activity of emodin. Network pharmacology and molecular docking were performed to screen the potential targets. Western blot analysis was used to explore a potential antitumor mechanism. The results showed that emodin (50–100 μmol/L) could significantly inhibit the proliferation of MCF-7 cells in a time and dose-dependent manner. Furthermore, virtual screening studies indicated that emodin was a potent aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) agonist in chemotherapy for breast cancer. Finally, when MCF-7 cells were treated with emodin (100 μmol/L) for 24 h, the AhR and cytochrome P450 1A1 (CYP1A1) protein expression levels were significantly upregulated compared with the control group. Our study indicated that emodin exhibited promising antitumor activity in MCF-7 cells, likely through activation of the AhR-CYP1A1 signaling pathway. These findings lay a foundation for the application of emodin in breast cancer treatment.
Highlights
Breast cancer is one of the most common malignant tumors that seriously threaten women’s health worldwide (Jia et al, 2015)
After treating the MCF-7 cells with increasing concentrations of emodin and longer exposure times, the number of living cells was significantly reduced, the cytoplasm size shrank, and the cells were no longer connected to fragments (Figure 2A), the results proved that emodin can cause cell death
The results indicated that treating MCF-7 cells with different concentrations of emodin resulted in reduced cell proliferation rates
Summary
Breast cancer is one of the most common malignant tumors that seriously threaten women’s health worldwide (Jia et al, 2015). According to the latest data from the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) in 2018, breast cancer ranks first among female cancers worldwide with an incidence rate of 24.2%. 52.9% of these breast cancer cases occur in developing countries and seriously threaten the lives of the patients (Ferlay et al, 2019). With the increasing incidence of breast cancer in women, surgery is currently the main clinical treatment, but adjuvant chemotherapy is widely used in breast cancer patients.
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