Objective: Alpinetin is a novel flavonoid that has demonstrated potent antitumor activity in previous studies. However, the efficacy and mechanism of alpinetin in treating lung cancer have not been determined.
Methods: We evaluated the impact of different doses and durations of alpinetin treatment on the cell proliferation, the apoptosis of lung cancer cells, as well as the drug-resistant lung cancer cells.
Results: This study showed that the alpinetin inhibited the cell proliferation, enhanced the apoptosis, and inhibited the PI3K/Akt signaling in lung cancer cells. Moreover, alpinetin significantly increased the sensitivity of drug-resistant lung cancer cells to the chemotherapeutic effect of cis-diammined dichloridoplatium. Taken together, this study demonstrated that alpinetin significantly suppressed the development of human lung cancer possibly by influencing mitochondria and the PI3K/Akt signaling pathway and sensitized drug-resistant lung cancer cells.
Conclusion: Alpinetin may be used as a potential compound for combinatorial therapy or as a complement to other chemotherapeutic agents when multiple lines of treatments have failed to reduce lung cancer.
Keywords: PI3K/Akt; alpinetin; cell proliferation and apoptosis; drug resistance reversal; lung cancer.