In Vitro Anti-Cervical Cancer Effect of Proteoglycans Isolated from Deep Sea Shark Cartilage by Inducing Apoptosis and Cell Cycle Arrest.

Abstract

The present study was aimed at studying in vitro anti-cervical cancer effect of proteoglycans (PGs) isolated from deep sea shark. Anti-proliferative activity and apoptotic involvement were confirmed by following assays viz, the cell viability assay by MTT assay, morphological analysis and colony formation assay. The sample showed a significant cytotoxic activity for HeLa cells and results showed that the PGs at a concentration of 250μg/mL inhibit the colony formation capacity. Apoptosis induction was confirmed by the chromatin condensation assay by Hoechst 33342 nuclear staining. A number of apoptotic HeLa cells displayed a round and shrunken cell body and chromatin condensation inside the nucleus suggesting that PGs-induced apoptosis caused cell death. Apoptosis of HeLa cells was further verified by annexin V-FITC (fluorescein isothiocyanate) and PI (propidium iodide) staining by flow cytometry. PGs were found to induce apoptosis and the ratio of apoptotic cells were 30.5%. Cell cycle arrest at G1/M and G2/M phase confirmed the cell death due to cell cycle arrest. Our study determined that proteoglycans effectively induced apoptosis and caused cell cycle arrestestablishing their antiproliferative effect against cervical cancer.