Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0006142 (breast cancer)
 160,383 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Gentian violet (GV) is a cationic triphenylmethane dye, with potent antifungal and antibacterial activity. We recently reported that in vitro GV suppresses the differentiation of bone resorbing osteoclasts while stimulating the differentiation and activity of bone forming osteoblasts. Breast cancer is highly metastatic to bone and drives bone turnover that further promotes cancer engraftment and expansion, the so-called vicious cycle. In humans, breast cancer metastases cause osteolytic lesions and skeletal damage that leads to bone fractures, an additional source of patient morbidity. The MDA-MB-231 human breast cancer cell line is a commonly used model of human breast cancer that when injected into mice metastasizes to bone causing osteolytic lesions by promoting osteoclastic bone resorption and/or suppressing osteoblastic bone formation. In the present study, we investigated the direct action of GV on MDA-MB-231 proliferation, and the capacity of GV to reverse the negative impact of MDA-MB-231 cells on osteoclast and osteoblast differentiation. Our data reveal for the first time that GV suppresses proliferation, and induces apoptosis, of MDA-MB-231 cells. We further demonstrated the capacity of GV to reverse the pro-osteoclastogenic and anti-osteoblastic activities of MDA-MB-231 cells in vitro. These data suggest that GV has important applications in the treatment of breast cancer through multiple actions including direct suppression of cancer cell proliferation, breaking the vicious cycle between cancer and bone, and alleviating the skeletal defects induced by bone metastasis.
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PMID:Gentian violet inhibits MDA-MB-231 human breast cancer cell proliferation, and reverses the stimulation of osteoclastogenesis and suppression of osteoblast activity induced by cancer cells. 2626 90

Gentian violet (GV), a cationic triphenylmethane dye, is used as an antifungal and antibacterial agent. Recently, attention has been focused on GV as a potential chemotherapeutic and antiangiogenic agent. The present study was undertaken to determine the suppressive effects of GV on human breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cells in vitro. The proliferation of MDA-MB-231 cells was suppressed by culture with GV (1-200 nM). The suppressive effects of GV on cell proliferation were not potentiated in the presence of various inhibitors that induce cell cycle arrest in vitro. This finding suggested that GV inhibits G1 and G2/M phase cell cycle arrest in MDA-MB-231 cells. The suppressive effects of GV on proliferation are mediated through the inhibition of various signaling pathways or nuclear transcription in vitro. Moreover, the suppressive effects of GV on cell proliferation were compared with that of gemcitabine, a strong antitumor agent that induces nuclear DNA damage. Notably, the culture with gemcitabine >50 nM suppressed cell proliferation, while the effects of GV were observed at >1 nM. The suppressive effects of gemcitabine on cell proliferation were not potentiated by GV. Overall, the present study demonstrated that GV exhibits a potential suppressive effect on the proliferation of human breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cells in vitro.
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PMID:Potential suppressive effects of gentian violet on human breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cells in vitro: Comparison with gemcitabine. 2744 79