Hinokitiol is found in the heartwood of cupressaceous plants and possesses several biological activities. Hinokitiol may play an important role in anti-inflammation and antioxidant processes, making it potentially useful in therapies for inflammatory-mediated disease. Previously, the suppression of tumor growth by hinokitiol has been shown to occur through apoptosis. Programmed cell death can also occur through autophagy, but the mechanism of hinokitiol-induced autophagy in tumor cells is poorly defined. We used an autophagy inhibitor (3-methyladenine) to demonstrate that hinokitiol can induce cell death via an autophagic pathway. Further, we suggest that hinokitiol induces autophagy in a dose-dependent manner. Markers of autophagy were increased after tumor cells were treated with hinokitiol. In addition, immunoblotting revealed that the levels of phosphoprotein kinase B (P-AKT), phosphomammalian target of rapamycin (P-mTOR), and phospho-p70 ribosomal s6 kinase (P-p70S6K) in tumor cells were decreased after hinokitiol treatment. In conclusion, our results indicate that hinokitiol induces the autophagic signaling pathway via downregulation of the AKT/mTOR pathway. Therefore, our findings show that hinokitiol may control tumor growth by inducing autophagic signaling.
Keywords: antitumor; autophagy; hinokitiol.
© 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.