Perspectives for Cancer Prevention With Natural Compounds (original) (raw)
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Cancer Prevention With Natural Compounds
Seminars in Oncology, 2010
Botanical and nutritional compounds have been used for the treatment of cancer throughout history. These compounds also may be useful in the prevention of cancer. Population studies suggest that a reduced risk of cancer is associated with high consumption of vegetables and fruits. Thus, the cancer chemopreventive potential of naturally occurring phytochemicals is of great interest. There are numerous reports of cancer chemopreventive activity of dietary botanicals, including cruciferous vegetables such as cabbage and broccoli, Allium vegetables such as garlic and onion, green tea, Citrus fruits, soybeans, tomatoes, berries, and ginger, as well as medicinal plants. Several lead compounds, such as genistein (from soybeans), lycopene (from tomatoes), brassinin (from cruciferous vegetables), sulforaphane (from asparagus), indole-3-carbinol (from broccoli), and resveratrol (from grapes and peanuts) are in preclinical or clinical trials for cancer chemoprevention. Phytochemicals have great potential in cancer prevention because of their safety, low cost, and oral bioavailability. In this review, we discuss potential natural cancer preventive compounds and their mechanisms of action. Semin Oncol 37:258-281.
Natural products for cancer prevention: a global perspective
Pharmacology & Therapeutics, 2003
The control of cancer, the second leading cause of death worldwide, may benefit from the potential that resides in alternative therapies. The primary carcinogens stem from a variety of agricultural, industrial, and dietary factors. Conventional therapies cause serious side effects and, at best, merely extend the patient's lifespan by a few years. There is thus the need to utilise alternative concepts or approaches to the prevention of cancer. This review focuses on the many natural products that have been implicated in cancer prevention and that promote human health without recognisable side effects. These molecules originate from vegetables, fruits, plant extracts, and herbs.
Role of Phytochemicals in Cancer Prevention
International Journal of Molecular Sciences
The use of synthetic, natural, or biological agents to minimize the occurrence of cancer in healthy individuals is defined as cancer chemoprevention. Chemopreventive agents inhibit the development of cancer either by impeding DNA damage, which leads to malignancy or by reversing or blocking the division of premalignant cells with DNA damage. The benefit of this approach has been demonstrated in clinical trials of breast, prostate, and colon cancer. The continuous increase in cancer cases, failure of conventional chemotherapies to control cancer, and excessive toxicity of chemotherapies clearly demand an alternative approach. The first trial to show benefit of chemoprevention was undertaken in breast cancer patients with the use of tamoxifen, which demonstrated a significant decrease in invasive breast cancer. The success of using chemopreventive agents for protecting the high risk populations from cancer indicates that the strategy is rational and promising. Dietary components such ...
European Journal of Cancer, 2021
Cancer is the second deadliest disease worldwide. Although recent advances applying precision treatments with targeted (molecular and immune) agents are promising, the histological and molecular heterogeneity of cancer cells and huge mutational burdens (intrinsic or acquired after therapy) leading to drug resistance and treatment failure are posing continuous challenges. These recent advances do not negate the need for alternative approaches such as chemoprevention, the pharmacological approach to reverse, suppress or prevent the initial phases of carcinogenesis or the progression of premalignant cells to invasive disease by using nontoxic agents. Although data are limited, the success of several clinical trials in preventing cancer in high-risk populations suggests that chemoprevention is a rational, appealing, and viable strategy to prevent carcinogenesis. Particularly among higher risk groups the use of safe, nontoxic agents is the utmost consideration since these individuals have not yet developed invasive disease. Natural dietary compounds present in fruits, vegetables and spices are especially attractive for chemoprevention and treatment due to their easy availability, high margin of safety, relatively low cost and widespread human consumption. Hundreds of such compounds have been widely investigated for chemoprevention and treatment in the last few decades. Previously, we reviewed the most widely studied natural compounds and their molecular mechanisms, which were highly exploited by the cancer research community. In the time since our initial review, many promising new compounds have been identified. In this review, we critically review these promising new natural compounds, their molecular targets and mechanisms of anti-cancer activity which may create novel opportunities for further design and conduct of preclinical and clinical studies.
World journal of biological chemistry, 2016
Chemoprevention is one of the cancer prevention approaches wherein natural/synthetic agent(s) are prescribed with the aim to delay or disrupt multiple pathways and processes involved at multiple steps, i.e., initiation, promotion, and progression of cancer. Amongst environmental chemopreventive compounds, diet/beverage-derived components are under evaluation, because of their long history of exposure to humans, high tolerability, low toxicity, and reported biological activities. This compilation briefly covers and compares the available evidence on chemopreventive efficacy and probable mechanism of chemoprevention by selected dietary phytochemicals (capsaicin, curcumin, diallyl sulphide, genistein, green/black tea polyphenols, indoles, lycopene, phenethyl isocyanate, resveratrol, retinoids and tocopherols) in experimental systems and clinical trials. All the dietary phytochemicals covered in this review have demonstrated chemopreventive efficacy against spontaneous or carcinogen-ind...
Alternative medicine review : a journal of clinical therapeutic, 2001
This paper is the second of a series examining the use of nutritional supplements as chemopreventive agents. The animal and in vitro data are reviewed in support of their use. Human safety data and mechanisms of action are described as well. Many over-the-counter dietary supplements have been shown to have significant chemopreventive activity in preclinical studies. Few side effects are associated with even long-term use of these agents. Along with dietary and lifestyle risk-reducing strategies, nutritional supplementation appears to be a viable intervention for those considered to be at high risk of developing cancer.
Dietary Phytochemicals in Chemoprevention of Cancer
Current Medicinal Chemistry-Immunology, Endocrine & Metabolic Agents, 2005
Regular consumption of fruit and vegetables is associated with reduced risks of cancer, cardiovascular disease and other aging-related diseases. Convincing evidence exists suggesting that an increased fruit, vegetables, and grains consumption is a relatively easy and practical strategy to significantly reduce the incidence of chronic diseases. Cancer chemoprevention intends to interrupt the carcinogenesis process, which includes initiation, promotion and progression of otherwise normal cells to reduce cancer. Despite the failure of β-carotene clinical trial to prevent lung cancer, the development of diet-derived constituents represents one of the major goal in cancer chemoprevention. A key question is whether a purified phytochemical has the same protective effects as does the whole food or mixture of foods in which the phytochemical is present. Putative chemopreventive agents are identified on the basis of epidemiological and in vitro and in vivo studies. All these compounds present tumor-suppressing properties in animal models of carcinogenesis, and they interfere with cellular processes involved in tumor formation, such as suppression of NF-kB and AP1 activation, induction of apoptosis, downregulation of β-catenin expression and activation of ARE/EpRE-dependent gene expression. Phase I clinical trials have been completed only for few of these phytochemicals, and pilot phase II-III trials are planned. In this review, we will begin by describing the different methodological approaches in studying chemopreventive agents, followed by the description of the mechanisms by which these compounds act. Finally, we will review more in details data concerning well-known and promising chemopreventive phytochemicals.
Cancer Chemoprevention by Natural Products: How Far Have We Come?
Pharmaceutical Research, 2010
Since ancient times, natural products, herbs and spices have been used for preventing several diseases, including cancer. The term chemoprevention was coined in the late 1970s and referred to the prevention of cancer by selective use of phytochemicals or their analogs. The field utilizes experimental carcinogenesis models to examine the efficacy of chemopreventive agents in a stage-specific manner. The concept of using naturally derived chemicals as potential chemopreventive agents has advanced the field dramatically. Throughout the years, a vast number of chemopreventive agents present in natural products have been evaluated using various experimental models. A number of them have progressed to early clinical trials. More recently, the focus has been directed towards molecular targeting of chemopreventive agents to identify mechanism(s) of action of these newly discovered bioactive compounds. Moreover, it has been recognized that single agents may not always be sufficient to provide chemopreventive efficacy, and, therefore, the new concept of combination chemoprevention by multiple agents or by the consumption of "whole foods" has become an increasingly attractive area of study. Novel technologies, such as nanotechnology, along with a better understanding of cancer stem cells, are certain to continue the advancement of the field of cancer chemoprevention in years to come.
Bioactive food components and cancer risk reduction
Journal of Cellular Biochemistry, 2008
Research over the last three decades has provided convincing evidence to support the premise that diets rich in fruits and vegetables may be protective against the risk of different types of cancers. Initial evidence for protective effect of fruits and vegetables against cancer risk came from population-based case-control studies, which prompted intense research aimed at (a) identification of bioactive component(s) responsible for the anticancer effects of fruits and vegetables, (b) elucidation of the mechanisms by which bioactive food components may prevent cancer, and (c) determination of their efficacy for prevention of cancer in animal models. The bioactive components responsible for cancer chemopreventive effects of various edible plants have now been identified. For instance, anticancer effect of Allium vegetables including garlic is attributed to organosulfur compounds (e.g., diallyl trisulfide). Interestingly, unlike cancer chemotherapy drugs, many bioactive food components selectively target cancer cells. Molecular basis for selectivity of anticancer bioactive food components towards cancer cells remains elusive, but these agents appear promiscuous and target multiple signal transduction pathways to inhibit cancer cell growth in vitro and in vivo. Despite convincing observational and experimental evidence, however, limited effort has been directed towards clinical investigations to determine efficacy of bioactive food components for prevention of human cancers. This article reviews current knowledge on cancer chemopreventive effects of a few highly promising dietary constituents, including garlic-derived organosulfides, berry compounds, and cruciferous vegetable-derived isothiocyanates, and serves to illustrate complexity of the signal transduction mechanisms in cancer chemoprevention by these promising bioactive food components. J. Cell. Biochem. 104: 339–356, 2008. © 2007 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
Anti-cancer potential of natural products: recent trends, scope and relevance
Anti-cancer potential of natural products: recent trends, scope and relevance, 2020
Disease can occur due to alterations in many physiological processes. A variety of factorsare known to be involved in the progression of cancer, a chronic diseasethat occurs due to permissible proliferative signaling, avoiding growth suppressors, resisting cell death, allowing replicative immortality, induction of angiogenesis, and inducing invasion and metastasis, along with reprogramming of metabolic pathways involved in energy production and avoiding the host immune response for cell destruction. Treatment of such a multifactorial disease has very less cure rate because of the singular agents tried in the past for targeting. Molecular level studies with deeper insight are urgently neededthat focus on the most promising herbal-derived bioactive substances for which thorough research was carried out in the literature in various databases such as PUB-MED, MEDLINE, SCOPUS indexed journals etc. to look for systematic reviews of the protocols or data interpretation, natural drug/immunological properties and validation. As immune system plays avery important role in the proliferation or suppression of cancer and other autoimmune diseases, It is the dire need to study the effect of such natural compound on the immune system so that a possible drug target or epitope can be identified for the treatment of such diseases. In nutshell there are many nonclinical in vitro and in vivo studies on herbal medicines which commonly supports the traditional therapeutic claims. It has been seen from the previos studies in literature that the yield and composition of bioactive compounds derived from plants are dependent upon the production source,culturing conditions and extraction protocols.Therefore appropriate optimization conditions would certainly assist the medical and scientific fraternity to accept herbal products as potential candidates for cancer treatment. In this article we explored the different natural products, their immunological effects concerning cancer with no or negligible side effects. However,one has to look for potential herb-drug or herb-epitope interactions and how immune system responds to such drugs.