Curcumin enhances the response of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma cells to ionizing radiation through further induction of cell cycle arrest at the G2/M phase and inhibition of mTOR phosphorylation.

It is crucial to enhance tumor radiosensitivity for the purpose of both lowering the dose of ionizing radiation (IR) and achieving higher antitumor efficacy. We identified curcumin as a radiosensitizer to enhance non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL) cell response to IR in vitro and further investigated the mechanism mediating this effect. We treated Namalwa, Ramos and Raji cell lines with vehicle, curcumin, IR and curcumin-IR. Cell viability and cell cycle distribution were determined to ascertain the radiosensitization effect of curcumin. DNA damage-related proteins, cell cycle regulatory proteins, phosphorylation of mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) and the nuclear translocation of the downstream nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) target were examined by western blotting. Treatment with curcumin led to decreased viability of all three types of NHL cells and had a profound radiosensitization effect. Pre-treatment with curcumin at a low concentration of 2 µmol/l increased IR-induced G2/M arrest in the cell cycle and increased the expression of cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitors, p21cip1 and p53. However, this effect was blocked when NHL cells were pre-treated with 10 µmol/l of KU55933, a specific inhibitor of ataxia-telangiectasia-mutated (ATM). Pre-treatment with curcumin inhibited the phosphorylation of mTOR and the nuclear translocation of the downstream NF-κB target induced by IR. Curcumin enhanced the cell response to IR in NHL mediated through the induction of G2/M phase arrest and the inhibition of both a constitutive and IR-induced activation of the mTOR-NF-κB pathway. This offers great potential for curcumin to be used in conjunction with radiotherapy for NHL in order to increase the efficiency of the treatment.