Crocin and Metformin suppress metastatic breast cancer progression via VEGF and MMP9 downregulations: in vitro and in vivo studies

Metastatic breast cancer remains a serious health concern and numerous investigations recommended medicinal plants as a complementary therapy. Crocin is one of the known anticancer bio-component. Recently, the inhibitory effect of metformin has been studied on the various aspects of cancer. However,...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Molecular and cellular biochemistry 2021-09, Vol.476 (9), p.3341-3351
Main Authors: Farahi, Ali, Abedini, Mohammad Reza, Javdani, Hossein, Arzi, Laleh, Chamani, Elham, Farhoudi, Ramin, Talebloo, Nazanin, Hoshyar, Reyhane
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adhesion
Adhesion tests
Analysis
Antidiabetics
Biochemistry
Biomedical and Life Sciences
Breast cancer
Cancer
Cardiology
Cell adhesion
Cell viability
Cytotoxicity
Gelatinase B
Herbal medicine
In vivo methods and tests
Invasiveness
Life Sciences
Medical Biochemistry
Medicinal plants
Medicine, Botanic
Medicine, Herbal
Metastases
Metastasis
Metformin
Oncology
Oncology, Experimental
Survival
Vascular endothelial growth factor
Weight reduction
Western blotting
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Metastatic breast cancer remains a serious health concern and numerous investigations recommended medicinal plants as a complementary therapy. Crocin is one of the known anticancer bio-component. Recently, the inhibitory effect of metformin has been studied on the various aspects of cancer. However, no study reported their combination effects on metastatic breast cancer. In the present study, we have assessed their anti-metastatic effects on in vitro and in vivo breast cancer models. Using MTT assay, scratch, and adhesion tests, we have evaluated the cytotoxic, anti-invasive and anti-adhesion effects of crocin and metformin on 4T1 cell line, respectively. Their protective effects and MMP9 as well as VEGF protein expression levels (Western blotting) investigated in the 4T1 murine breast cancer model. Our results showed that both crocin and metformin reduced cell viability, delayed scratch healing and inhibited the cell adhesion, in vitro. While crocin alone restored the mice’s weight reduction, crocin, metformin, and their combination significantly reduced the tumor volume size and enhanced animal survival rate in murine breast cancer model, responses that were associated with VEGF and MMP9 down-regulation. These findings suggest that a combination of crocin and metformin could serve as a novel therapeutic approach to enhance the effectiveness of metastatic breast cancer therapy.
ISSN:0300-8177
1573-4919
DOI:10.1007/s11010-020-04043-8