Marine algal fucoxanthin inhibits the metastatic potential of cancer cells

Antitumor and Cancer-preventative Function of Fucoxanthin: A Marine Carotenoid

“…Chung et al revealed that intraperitoneal injection of fucoxanthin (0.1 mg/mouse) inhibited lung metastasis as indicated by a reduction in metastatic foci on the lung surface and reduced metastatic nodule numbers in lung tissues of mice injected with B16-F10 melanoma cells through their tail veins (34).…”

Could Fucoxanthin Interaction with Lipid Rafts Mediate its Cytotoxicity in Cancer Cells?

“…Structure and biological activity of fucoxanthin and carotenoids in cancer cells [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18] Biological functions of carotenoids in cell membranes [19][20][21][22] Interaction of carotenoids with lipid rafts [23] Cell model to study the integration of xenobiotics into lipid rafts [24] Antioxidant and pro-oxidant activity of fucoxanthin in animal cells and tissues [25][26][27] Structure and function of lipid rafts in cell membranes [28,29] Targeting lipid rafts in cancer cells [30][31][32][33][34][35][36] Ion channels, lipid rafts and cancer cells [37,38] Lipid rafts, cytoskeleton, cancer cells invasivity and tumor angiogenesis [30,40] …”

“…Particularly, fucoxanthin ( Figure 1), a marine carotenoid purified from brown micro-and macroalgae, attracts extensive interest owing to its antiproliferative, pro-apoptotic and pro-autophagic activities, demonstrated in a large panel of cancer cells [3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14]. Its antitumoral activity was validated in animal models, in which it limits tumor growth, angiogenesis and invasivity, suggesting a possible use for clinical oncology [1,15].…”

“…It also inhibits matrix metalloproteases involved in tumor tissular invasivity [8,18], and induces autophagy in some cancer cell models [19]. This multimodal activity has led us to hypothesize that the cytotoxic activity of fucoxanthin may be related, at least in part, to a nonspecific integration into plasma and/or intracellular membranes, triggering a wide variety of cellular responses eventually leading to cancer cells apoptosis or autophagy.…”

“…Thus, integration of fucoxanthin in lipid rafts may induce major disturbances in these regulatory pathways and dysfunctions of the cytoskeleton. Fucoxanthin was also reported to decrease the expression of CD44 [8], a cell surface glycoprotein involved in cell-cell interactions, cell adhesion and migration, and interaction with matrix metalloproteases (MMPs), that plays a critical function in invasion of the tissular environment of the tumor by cancer cells. Lipid rafts play a crucial role in the localization and functionality of CD44 as proved using cholesterol-depleting agents, that stimulate CD44 shedding and supress cancer cell migration [40].…”