Abstract
The second most biggest cancer worldwide is breast cancer. There is an increasing need for safer, effective, and affordable drug candidates from natural sources to treat breast cancer. In the present investigation, the anticancer effect ofCucurbita ficifoliaBouche (C.ficifolia) fruit extract was tested on the human breast cancer cells such as MCF-7. The cells were exposed with different doses ofC.ficifolia, for the assessment of IC(50)concentrations on the MCF-7 cell lines for 24 hs. The effect ofC.ficifoliafruit extract on morphological and apoptotic changes were evaluated by specific fluorescence staining techniques and real-time PCR in a time-dependent manner for 24 hs and 48 hs. The IC(50)value forC.ficifoliafruit extract was found to be 90 mu g/mL. Morphological alteration and apoptotic distinctiveness aspect like chromatin condensation and nuclear fragmentation were noticed inC. ficifoliaextract exposed breast cancer cells. Further, we observed thatC.ficifoliaextract-induced programmed cell death in the MCF-7 cells were mediated with the elevated expression of the tumor suppressor gene such as p53 and apoptotic markers such as caspase-8, caspase-9, caspase-3, fatty acid synthase (FAS), Fas-associated protein with death domain (FADD), Bcl-2 homologous antagonist/killer (BAK), and Bcl-2-associated X protein (BAX). These observations established thatC.ficifoliasignificantly concealed the cell division and provoked p53/caspase-mediated programmed cell death. Further, we noticed that this cell death in MCF-7 cells is concentration and time dependent. As evaluated through the comet assay,C.ficifoliainduced DNA damage; further upon increasing the duration of the treatment, the DNA damage was higher than before. Thus, our study concludes thatC.ficifoliacould serve as an effective anticancer agent through vital gene modulation.