Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory of Dong Medicine, Hunan Province Key Laboratory for Antibody-Based Drug and Intelligent Delivery System, Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory for Synthetic Biology of Traditional Chinese Medicine, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hunan University of Medicine, Huaihua, China.
Institute of Laboratory Medicine, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Medical Molecular Diagnostics, School of Medical Technology, The First Dongguan Affiliated Hospital, Guangdong Medical University, Dongguan, China.
Scanning. 2022 Jul 22;2022:1422185. doi: 10.1155/2022/1422185. eCollection 2022.
Gambogic acid (GA), a kind of polyprenylated xanthone derived from Garcinia hanburyi tree, has showed spectrum anticancer effects both in vitro and in vivo with low toxicity. However, up to now, there is little information about the effects of GA on esophageal cancer. In this study, we aim to test the anticancer effects of GA on esophageal cancer EC9706 cells. We established a nanoscale imaging method based on AFM to evaluate the reactive oxygen species- (ROS-) mediated anticancer effects of GA on esophageal cancer regarding the morphological and ultrastructural changes of esophageal cancer cells. The obtained results demonstrated that GA could inhibit cell proliferation, induce apoptosis, induce cell cycle arrest, and induce mitochondria membrane potential disruption in a ROS-dependent way. And using AFM imaging, we also found that GA could induce the damage of cellular morphology and increase of membrane height distribution and membrane roughness in EC9706 cells, which could be reversed by the removal of GA-induced excessive intracellular ROS. Our results not only demonstrated the anticancer effects of GA on EC9706 cells in ROS-dependent mechanism but also strongly suggested AFM as a powerful tool for the detection of ROS-mediated cancer cell apoptosis on the basis of imaging.
藤黄酸（GA）是一种从藤黄树中提取的多聚异戊二烯基呫吨酮，具有体外和体内广谱抗癌作用，且毒性低。然而，到目前为止，关于 GA 对食管癌的作用的信息还很少。在本研究中，我们旨在测试 GA 对食管癌 EC9706 细胞的抗癌作用。我们建立了一种基于原子力显微镜（AFM）的纳米成像方法，以评估 GA 对食管癌的 ROS 介导的抗癌作用，观察食管癌细胞的形态和超微结构变化。结果表明，GA 可以通过 ROS 依赖性方式抑制细胞增殖，诱导细胞凋亡，诱导细胞周期停滞，并破坏线粒体膜电位。通过 AFM 成像，我们还发现 GA 可以诱导细胞形态损伤，增加细胞膜高度分布和膜粗糙度，而 GA 诱导的细胞内过量 ROS 的去除可以逆转这些变化。我们的结果不仅证明了 GA 在 ROS 依赖性机制下对 EC9706 细胞的抗癌作用，而且还强烈表明 AFM 是一种强大的工具，可以基于成像检测 ROS 介导的癌细胞凋亡。
