Int. J. Mol. Sci.
(ISSN 1422-0067,
CODEN: IJMCFK)
            Special Issue: Natural Compounds for            
Cancer Treatment and Prevention  

This special issue belongs to the section  "Nutraceuticals and Chemopreventives"
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[Editors] [Call for Papers] [Published Papers[List of Keywords] [Announced Papers]


Editors

 

Guest Editor

Dr. Munna L. Argawal

Case Comprehensive Cancer Center, Case Western Reserve University, 10900 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland OH 44106, USA
Tel: 216-368-5676; Fax: 216-368-8919
E-mail: munna.agarwal@case.edu

URL: http://genetics.case.edu/?page_id=5&LN=Agarwal&FN=Munna

 

Call for Papers

Download the call for paper message here.

Keywords
Submission
 
Deadline for Submissions: 30 April 2008
 
You may send your manuscript soon or by 30 April 2008. Papers accepted will be published immediately. Finally, all the papers belonging to this special issue will be gathered together in a homepage. Therefore, you may submit your paper now. The time taken between submission and publication can be less than 1 month now. For review papers, the title and a short abstract can be sent to ijms@mdpi.org (copy to Dr. Munna L. Agarwal, E-mail: munna.agarwal@case.edu) as soon as possible.
 
Announced Papers:  

Manuscript ID: IJMS-22-06
Title: Mechanisms of Cancer Prevention by Green Tea Catechin EGCG – Targeting Receptor Tyrosine Kinases by EGCG might be a Promising Strategy for Cancer Prevention
Type: Review
Authors:
Masahito Shimizu and Hisataka Moriwaki

Affiliations: Department of Internal Medicine, Gifu University School of Medicine, Gifu 501-1194, Japan

Abstract:  Download the abstract


Manuscript ID: IJMS-22-08
Title: Anti-cancer and Anti-inflammatory Triterpenes from Mushroom Ganoderma Lucidum
Type: Review
Author:
Daniel Sliva

Affiliations: Cancer Research Laboratory, Methodist Research Institute, Indianapolis, IN, U.S.A.; Department of Medicine, and Indiana University Cancer Center, School of Medicine, Indiana University, Indianapolis, IN, USA; E-mail: DSliva@clarian.org Sliva

Abstract: Download the abstract


Manuscript ID: IJMS-22-09
Title: Volatile Oils: Promising Natural Plant Extracts for Prevention and Potential Therapy of Cancer
Type: Review
Author:
Amr E. Edris
Affiliations: Aroma & Flavor Chemistry Department, National Research Center, Dokki, Cairo, Egypt; E-mail: amr_edris@hotmail.com
Abstract: Download the abstract
 
Manuscript ID: IJMS-22-11
Title: Curcumin and Analogues as Lead Compounds for Development of Anticancer Agents
Type: Review
Authors:
Ângelo de Fátima 1,*, Luzia V. Modolo 2, Carmen V. Ferreira 3,  Ana Tereza M. Neres 1
Affiliations: 1 Grupo de Estudos em Química Orgânica e Biológica (GEQOB), Departamento de Química, Instituto de Ciências Exatas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), Av. Pres. Antônio Carlos, 6627, Pampulha, Belo Horizonte, MG, 31270-901, Brazil; 2 Plant Biology Division, The Samuel Roberts Noble Foundation, 2510 Sam Noble Parkway, Ardmore, OK, 73401, USA.; 3 Departamento de Bioquímica, Instituto de Biologia, Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP), CP 6109, Campinas, SP, 13083-970, Brazil; * Author to whom correspondence shoud be addressed; E-mail: angelo_de_fatima@yahoo.com.br
Download the abstract
 
Manuscript ID: IJMS-22-12
Title: Natural Polyphenols and Their Role in Cancer Prevention and Treatment
Type: Review
Authors:
Di Chen, (t.b.a.), and Q. Ping Dou
Affiliations: The Prevention Program, Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, and Department of Pathology, School of Medicine, Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan, USA; * Author to whom correspondence shoud be addressed; E-mail: doup@karmanos.org
Abstract: Download the abstract

Manuscript ID: IJMS-22-15
Title: From the Sea to the Clinic
Type: Review
Authors: Laura Paleari 1, Alessia Catassi 1, Alessia Grozio 1, Alfredo Cesario 2,3 and Patrizia Russo 1
Affiliations: 1 Lung Cancer Unit, National Cancer Institute, Genoa, Italy; 2 Thoracic Surgery Unit, Catholic University, Rome, Italy; 3 IRCCS "San Raffaele", Rome, Italy; * Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; Lung Cancer Unit, National Institute for Cancer Research, Largo R. Benzi 10, 16132 Genova, Italia; E-mail:laura.paleari@istge.it
Abstract: Isolation and identification of plant or animal derived compounds with pharmacological activities continues to expand, particularly in discovery of cancer chemotherapy drugs.Nature represents an attractive source of potential therapeutic candidate agents derived from the tremendous chemical diversity found in millions of species of plants, animals, and microorganisms. In the depths of the sea there is an abundant source of biologically active products reflecting ecological adaptation shaped during evolution and allowing organisms to survive and flourish in spite of predators and parasites. The chemical and biological diversity of the marine environment is beyond measure and therefore is an extraordinary resource for the discovery of new anticancer drugs. Recent technological and methodological advances in structure elucidation, organic synthesis, and biological assay have resulted in the isolation and clinical evaluation of novel anticancer agents. This review articles presents recent research findings with regard to bioactive natural products marine invertebrates and their synthetic derivatives that are currently undergoing clinical evaluation as antineoplastic drugs.

Manuscript ID: IJMS-22-17
Type: Review
Title: Roles of Probiotics and Prebiotics in Colonic Cancer Prevention: Postulated Mechanisms and In-vivo Evidence
Authors: Wai-Yee Choon1 and Min-Tze Liong2*
Affiliations: 1 School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 11800 Minden, Penang, Malaysia; 2 Food Technology Division, School of Industrial Technology, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 11800 Minden, Penang, Malaysia; * Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-mail: mintze.liong@usm.my
Abstract: The cure for cancer continues to elude medical science. Although recent development in chemotherapeutic drugs and targeted therapy offers hope to prolong survival among cancer sufferers, the disease still carries a gloom outcome.  One of the more prevalent cancers is colon cancer, leading to the need for prevention rather than cure. Research into colorectal cancer prevention has led to a better understanding of its aetiology and discovery of the potential anti-carcinogenic effects of probiotics and prebiotics.  The issue of interest at hand is whether probiotics and prebiotics can indeed confer protection against colorectal cancer in humans and thus, reduce the risk of contracting this disease significantly. A review of the postulated mechanisms, evidence from laboratory animal studies, human epidemiological and experimental studies will attempt to address this issue.

Manuscript ID: IJMS-22-19
Type: Review
Title: Natural Compounds for Cancer Treatment and Prevention
Authors: Donatella Lippi 1, Letizia Bausi 2, Stefania Nobili 3, Enrico Mini 3 and Sergio Capaccioli 2
Affiliations: Departments of (1) Anatomy, Histology and Forensic Medicine, (2) Experimental Pathology and Oncology, and (3) Pharmacology, University of Florence, Florence, Italy
Abstract: Evidence of cancer has been found in ancient human remains and in  medical literature from antiquity, dating back to pharaonic Egypt and the classical world. Although it is difficult to interpret the diagnosis of physicians who lived so many centuries ago, we can assume that many of their descriptions  related to cases of cancer.
This ancient medical literature reports that surgery was performed but that physicians also recommended the use of some natural, and especially plant products, which represent an interesting point of comparison with current knowledge. Natural products play a dominant role in cancer chemotherapeutics with more than 70% of anticancer compounds being either natural products or derived from natural products. International anticancer drug discovery programs such as those promoted by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), that are focused on the screening of a large series of compounds, including natural ones, have played an important role in the discovery and development of anticancer drugs. During the last few years, many efforts have been made in the field of natural-product-based drug discovery because of increasing reliance on newer technologies, such as combinatorial synthesis and high-throughput screening, and their associated approaches to drug discovery. Thus, most of the anticancer agents available today in the oncology clinic derive from plants, animals, marine organisms and microorganisms. Vincristine, irinotecan, etoposide and paclitaxel are classic examples of plant-derived compounds; bleomycin and doxorubicin of drugs coming from microbial sources, and citarabine emanating from a marine source. To date, new generations of taxanes, anthracyclines, Vinka alkaloids, camptothecins, as well as the novel class of epothilones have been developed. Some of these are in clinical use, others in clinical trials. Other agents originating from marine sources (e.g. bryostatin-1, ET-743) have also entered clinical trials. These drugs are characterized by a variety of different mechanisms of action including e.g. interaction with microtubules, inhibition of topoisomerases I or II, alkylation of DNA, etc.This review describes, under different levels of observation, the main natural compounds used in cancer therapy and prevention. Within the framework of their historical aspects and pharmacognosy, which is the study of their natural producers, plants and animals, and their chemical composition, a variety of paradigmatic natural compounds will be described. Two main roles of these compounds will be considered: that of drugs contained in herbal medicines and that of therapeutic molecules extracted from plants or animals and now, most frequently, prototypes of improved synthetic molecules. These aspects will be integrated and updated by also focusing on the most recent knowledge of the molecular aspects of their interactions with their recognized cellular targets, from DNA to microtubules. Some critical aspects of current cancer chemotherapy will also be pointed out under the auspices of newer pharmacological disciplines such as pharmacogenetics and pharmacogenomics, as well as that of a recent revolutionary theory of cancer: whereby not cancer gene mutations but caretaker genes and/or aneuploidy are the primum movens of cancer.
 
Type: Review
Title: Betulinic Acid for Cancer Treatment and Prevention
Authors: Simone Fulda
Affiliations: University Children’s Hospital, Eythstr. 24, 89075 Ulm, Germany
Abstract: Betulinic acid (BA) is a naturally occurring pentacyclic triterpene that exhibits a variety of biological activities including potent antitumor properties. This anticancer activity has been linked to its ability to directly trigger mitochondrial membrane permeabilization, a central event in the apoptotic process that seals the cell’s fate. In contrast to the potent cytotoxicity of BA against a variety of cancer types, non-malignant cells and normal tissue remained relatively resistant to BA, indicating a therapeutic window. Since agents that exert a direct action on mitochondria may trigger cell death under circumstances in which standard chemotherapeutics fail, there is increasing interest to develop such compounds as experimental cancer therapeutics. Thus, mitochondrion-targeted agents such as BA hold great promise as a novel approach to bypass certain forms of drug resistance in human cancers.

Type: Full Research Paper
Title: Novel Routes toward Selective Reactions in Cephalostatin Series
Authors: Mansour Nawasreh
Abstract: This work aimed at selective synthesis of analogues to the cephalostatin 1, a highly potential anti-cancer marine natural product. In this work, we summarized the work of five years studying the selectivity of certain reactions of cephalostatin-like bis-steroidal pyrazines and hence, the biological activity variation. This study includes chemo, regio and stereoselectivity reactions of analogues starting from the symmetrical bis-steroidal diketone 3, which can be synthesize in a gram scale from the commercially available hecogenine acetate 1a. The following routes has been tested;  the regioselective hydroboration of the exocyclic double bond at C-12, the regioselective F-Ring opening of the spiroketals moieties, the chemo and regioselective hydroboration of ∆14,15 double bond and the chemo and regioselective reduction of the carbonyl group at C-12.
 
Published Papers:


Tsai-Hua Kao, Rwei-Fen S. Huang and Bing-Huei Chen *
Department of Nutrition and Food Sciences, Fu Jen University, Taipei 242, Taiwan
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-mail: 002622@mail.fju.edu.tw; Tel.: 886-2-29053626; Fax: 886-2-29021215
Received: 10 September 2007; in revised form: 30 October 2007  / Accepted: 5 November 2007 / Published: 21 November 2007
Full Research Paper: Antiproliferation of Hepatoma Cell and Progression of Cell Cycle as Affected by Isoflavone Extracts from Soybean Cake
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2007, 8, 1095-1110 (PDF format, 475K)
 

Yuko Yonezawa 1, Hiromi Yoshida 1,2 and Yoshiyuki Mizushina 1,2,*
1 Laboratory of Food & Nutritional Sciences, Department of Nutritional Science, Kobe-Gakuin University, Nishi-ku, Kobe, Hyogo 651-2180, Japan. E-mails: yonezawa@nutr.kobegakuin.ac.jp (Y. Y.); yoshida@nutr.kobegakuin.ac.jp (H. Y.)
2 Cooperative Research Center of Life Sciences, Kobe-Gakuin University, Nishi-ku, Kobe, Hyogo 651-2180, Japan.
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; Tel.: +81-78-974-1551 (ext. 3232), Fax: +81-78-974-5689; E-mail: mizushin@nutr.kobegakuin.ac.jp (Y. M.)
Received: 6 November 2007; in revised from: 16 November 2007  / Accepted: 21 November 2007 / Published: 7 December 2007
Review: Mechanism of Growth Inhibition of Human Cancer Cells by Conjugated Eicosapentaenoic Acid, an Inhibitor of DNA Polymerase and Topoisomerase
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2007, 8, 1206-1224 (PDF format, 1064K)
 

Ewelina Szliszka, Zenon P. Czuba, Katarzyna Jernas,Wojciech Król *
Chair and Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Jordana 19, 41 808 Zabrze
Medical University of Silesia, Katowice, Poland, Tel. / Fax: +48 032 2722554
E-mail: wkrol@sum.edu.pl (W. K.), zczuba@sum.edu.pl (Z. C.)
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Received: 16 August 2007; in revised form: 3 January 2008 / Accepted: 17 January 2008 / Published: 21 January 2008
Full Research Paper:
Dietary Flavonoids Sensitize HeLa Cells to Tumor Necrosis Factor-Related Apoptosis-Inducing Ligand (TRAIL)
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2008, 9, 56-64 (PDF format, 121K)
 

Massimo D’Archivio, Carmela Santangelo, Beatrice Scazzocchio, Rosaria Varì, Carmela Filesi, Roberta Masella *,# and Claudio Giovannini #
National Centre for Food Quality and Risk Assessment, Istituto Superiore di Sanità, Viale Regina Elena 299, 00161 Rome Italy
E-mails: maxdar@iss.it (M.A.); carmela.santangelo@iss.it (C.S.); beatrice.scazzocchio@iss.it (B.S.); rosaria.vari@iss.it (R.V.); carmelina.filesi@iss.it (C.F.); roberta.masella@iss.it (R.M.); clagiovn@iss.it (C.G.); Tel. & Fax: +39 0649902763
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-mail: roberta.masella@iss.it
# Both authors should be considered as senior authors
Received: 3 August 2007 / in revised form: 30 November 2007 / Accepted: 23 January 2008 / Published: 28 February 2008
Review:  
Modulatory Effects of Polyphenols on Apoptosis Induction: Relevance for Cancer Prevention
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2008, 9, 213-228 (PDF format, 435K)

Open Access
Harini S. Aiyer 1, Manicka V. Vadhanam 1, Radka Stoyanova 3, Gerard D. Caprio 3, Margie L. Clapper 3 and Ramesh C. Gupta 1, *
1 James Graham Brown Cancer Center, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY 40202, USA
2 Department of Pharmacology & Toxicology, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY 40202, USA
3 Division of Population Sciences, Fox Chase Cancer Center, Philadelphia, PA 19111, USA
E-mails: aiyerharini@gmail.com; mvvadh01@louisville.edu; Margie.Clapper@fccc.edu; rcgupta@louisville.edu
* Author to whom correspondence be addressed. Ramesh Gupta, Brown Cancer Center, Delia Baxter II, Room 304E, 580 Preston Street, Louisville, KY 40202, USA; Tel. +1-502-852-3682; E-mail: rcgupta@louisville.edu
Received: 17 January 2008 / Accepted: 1 February 2008 / Published: 12 March 2008
Full Research Paper:
Dietary Berries and Ellagic Acid Prevent Oxidative DNA Damage and Modulate Expression of DNA Repair Genes
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2008, 9, 327-341 (PDF format, 1338K)
 
Open Access
Yukihiro Akao *, Yoshihito Nakagawa and Yoshinori Nozawa
Gifu International Institute of Biotechnology, 1-1 Naka-Fudogaoka, Kakamigahara, Gifu 504-0838, Japan; Tel: +81-583-71-4646, Fax: +81-583-71-4412
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: yakao@giib.or.jp
Received: 10 January 2008 / in revised form: 13 February 2008 / Accepted: 15 February 2008 / Published: 14 March 2008
Review: Anti-Cancer Effects of Xanthones from Pericarps of Mangosteen
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2008, 9, 355-370 (PDF format, 1145K)
 
Open Access
Yoshihide Usami,* Hayato Ichikawa and Masao Arimoto
Osaka University of Pharmaceutical Sciences, 4-20-1 Nasahara, Takatsuki, Osaka 569-1094, Japan
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-mail: usami@gly.oups.ac.jp
Received: 10 January 2008; in revised form: 18 March 2008 / Accepted: 19 March 2008 / Published: 24 March 2008
Review: Synthetic Efforts for Stereo Structure Determination of Cytotoxic Marine Natural Product Pericosines as Metabolites of Periconia sp. from Sea Hare
Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2008, 9, 401-421 (PDF format, 423K)

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