Abstract
B5
Cancer chemoprevention is defined as the use of natural, synthetic, or biologic chemical agents to reverse, suppress, or prevent carcinogenic progression to invasive cancer. The success of several recent clinical trials in preventing cancer in high-risk populations suggests that chemoprevention is a rational and appealing strategy. >Recently, several isolated plant products and crude extracts that have a combination of various bioactive molecules capable of cancer prevention through different mechanisms have been investigated. >Tinospora cordifolia (Family- Menispermaceae) is a glabrous, succulent, climbing shrub widely used in medicine for treatment of different ailments such as jaundice, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, gout, skin diseases and infections. Furthermore, this plant exhibits certain mechanisms under different experimental conditions such as free radical scavenging, calcium channel blocking, inhibition of lipid peroxidation, enhancement of DNA repair and stimulation of stem cell proliferation that are required for chemoprevention. >For this purpose, the inhibition of skin papillomas by root extract of this plant (TCE) has been evaluated on two-stage process of skin carcinogenesis in Swiss albino mice, induced by a single application of 7, 12-dimethylabenz (a) anthracene (100µg/100µl of acetone) and two weeks later promoted by repeated application of croton oil (1% in acetone/thrice a week) till the end of the experiment i.e 16 weeks. The tumor incidence, tumor yield, tumor burden and cumulative number of papillomas were found to be higher in the DMBA treated control as compared to TCE treated experimental animals. The difference in the values of above parameters of both the groups were statistically analyzed and found to be significant. Thus, the present study demonstrates the anti-tumor activity of this plant and its possible use in the field of chemoprevention.
Sixth AACR International Conference on Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research-- Dec 5-8, 2007; Philadelphia, PA