Apoptotic effect of physcion isolated from marine fungus Microsporum sp. in PC3 human prostate cancer cells

Abstract

Background: Apoptosis is a process of programmed cell death, and apoptosis defect results in serious diseases such as cancer. Apoptosis induction is one of the key mechanisms of anti-cancer agents. This study was aimed to find anti-prostate cancer compounds from marine-derived fungus Microsporum sp. Results: We found that physcion isolated from the fermentation broth extract of the marine fungus Microsporum sp. strain MFS-YL decreases the cell proliferation of PC3 human prostate cancer cells. Physcion induced cell apoptosis as determined by Annexin V/propidium iodide double staining. Physcion downregulated the anti-apopotoic proteins such as Ras, Bcl-xL, and Bcl-2, whereas upregulated the pro-apoptotic Bax. Physcion also activated caspase-3, caspase-8, and caspase-9. Conclusion: These results suggest that physcion from Microsporum sp. inhibits the proliferation of PC3 human prostate cancer cells via the pathway leading to apoptotic cell death. Physcion may be a potential candidate in the field of anticancer drug discovery against human prostate cancer.

Petromurin C Induces Protective Autophagy and Apoptosis in FLT3-ITD-Positive AML: Synergy with Gilteritinib

“…Our results are similar to those of the dihydroxyanthraquinone physcion, which is a secondary metabolite of the marine-derived fungus Microsporum sp. This induced apoptosis by downregulating anti-apoptotic proteins and activation of caspases 3 and 9 [23]. In addition to activation of caspase 9, mitochondrial outer membrane permeabilization (MOMP) is also responsible for cell death via intrinsic apoptosis [8].…”

Physcion and Physcion 8-O-β-D-glucopyranoside: Natural Anthraquinones with Potential Anticancer Activities

“…In addition to intrinsic pathway, physcion also induces apoptosis in nasopharyngeal CNE2 cell line via extrinsic pathway which is obvious by increased expression of Fas, DR5 (death receptor-5), TRAIL (TNF-related apoptosis-inducing ligand), and caspase-8 [26]. Down-regulation of Bid (BH3 interacting domain death agonist) and increased caspase-8 activity by physcion is also found in MDA-MB-231 and PC3 cells along with increased caspase-9 expression [22,96].…”

“…Physcion results in the down-regulation of Bcl-2 [19,[22][23]25] and Ras [96], up-regulation of Bax [19,23,25,96], loss of MMP (mitochondrial membrane potential) [19,40,[67][68], opening of MPT (mitochondrial permeability transition) pore [40], release of cytochrome c to the cytosol [26,40,[67][68], enhanced expression of activated caspase-3 and -9 [19, 22-23, 25, 40, 67-68, 96],…”

Marine Natural Products with Activities against Prostate Cancer: Recent Discoveries

“…strain MFS-YL was collected from the surface of the marine red alga Lomentaria catenata , found in the Republic of Korea, and cultured for 30 days. The fermentation broth was extracted with ethyl acetate, fractionated and the pure compound physcion successfully isolated, as confirmed by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and mass spectral (MS) analyses [ 43 ]. Physcion was evaluated at different concentrations (0–100 μM) and found to decrease proliferation of PC3 cells in a dose-dependent manner, with activity observed starting at 25 μM.…”