Chemopreventive and Chemotherapeutic Potential of Curcumin in Breast Cancer

Abstract

Breast cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death among females worldwide. It signifies a shift from the previous decade during which the most common cause of cancer death was cervical cancer. Current treatment modalities, including surgery, radiotherapy, and adjuvant chemotherapy or hormone therapy, have not been successful enough to impart significant improvement in the morbidity or mortality of breast cancer. This cancer is highly resistant to chemotherapy as no effective treatment exists for advanced disease conditions. Moreover, there is a dearth of ideal protein biomarkers of breast cancer in plasma or serum that can be used with desired sensitivity and specificity. Along with the existing therapeutic modalities of breast cancer the focus of researchers and clinicians have shifted towards the exploration of the preventive and therapeutic uses of natural products, including dietary phytoconstituents. Curcumin, the principal active component of Indian curry spice turmeric, has been found to exert preventive and therapeutic effects in various cancers. This is, in part, due to its ability to influence a diverse range of molecular targets and signaling pathways. The ability of curcumin to enhance the efficacy of existing chemotherapeutic agents is an added advantage. The current review critically analyzes various aspects of curcumin-related research conducted for molecular understanding of its efficacy in in vitro and in vivo models of breast cancer. The article also highlights recent developments with synthetic analogs of curcumin and nanocurcumin which are in the horizon of next generation targeted therapy with curcumin in breast cancer.

Curcumin inhibits the growth of liver cancer stem cells through the phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase/protein kinase B/mammalian target of rapamycin signaling pathway

“…The results are expressed as the mean ± standard deviation. exert a potential anticancer effect in multiple cancer types, inhibiting the cancer-associated proliferation, migration and angiogenesis (30)(31)(32)(33).…”

Crateva adansonii DC, an African ethnomedicinal plant, exerts cytotoxicity in vitro and prevents experimental mammary tumorigenesis in vivo

“…Increasingly, various medicinal plants are being screened for anticancer properties and may provide effective therapeutic agents. Numerous phytoconstituents against breast tumour cells are well documented as well as those preventing the occurrence of mammary tumours in various experimental animal models via modulation of proliferation, differentiation, apoptosis, oxidative stress, inflammation, angiogenesis and several cell signalling pathways involved in breast cancer (Sinha et al, 2012;Reuben et al, 2012;Vadodkar et al, 2012;Parikh et al, 2014;Siddiqui et al, 2015;Magne Nde et al, 2015;Sinha et al, 2016).…”

Curcumin inhibits PhIP induced cytotoxicity in breast epithelial cells through multiple molecular targets

“…Curcumin inhibits cell proliferation and has anticancer effects [19]. Recently, several researchers have demonstrated the anticancer effect of curcumin in prostate [20,21], breast [22][23][24][25], colon [26][27][28], and liver cancer [29]. Thus, curcumin has gained interest as a dietary supplement because there is substantial evidence in preclinical models that curcumin is a potent chemopreventive dietary agent [30][31][32].…”