Effects of the Bee Venom on Human Gastric Adenocarcinoma Cell Lines

Bee Venom(below BV) has been used in alternative medicine to treat the diseases, such as pain diseases. BV contains a variety of peptides, including melittin, apamin, adolapin, MCD peptide, enzymes(i.e. PLA2), amines(i.e. histamine and epinephrine), and nonpeptide components. The two main components of BV are melittin and PLA2. The cell cytotoxic effects through the activation of PLA2 by melittin have been suggested to be the critical mechanism for the depress of cancer cell. Melittin and PLA2 have been reported to induce apoptosis and to possess anti-cancer effects and neurite outgrowth in PC12 cells. Analysis of proliferation was confirmed by MTT assay. BV decreased cell number through dose- and duration-dependent manner and these effects are apparent at a concentration of 3 ${\mu}g/ml$. To observe which signaling molecules will be activated by BV, phosphorylation of ERK, p38 MAPK, JNK and ERM were examined by Western blot analysis. To study the long term effect of BV in human gastric adenocarcinoma cell lines, the image of cells treated with BV for 4 days were obtained. BV was shown to exhibit anti-cancer activity in human gastric adenocarcinoma cell lines at a broad range of concentrations of 3 ${\mu}g/ml$. ERK, p38 MAPK and JNK were found to increase in BV treated cells. However, ERM which known to be involved in the cell death, was gradually decreased to 30minutes after addition 3 ${\mu}g/ml$ of BV. These results provide a possible BV-induced inhibitory signal for cancer proliferation that is initiated by the decrease in ERM activity. Moreover, it is likely that the activation of ERK, p38 MAPK and JNK are required for the BV-induced inhibition of cancer proliferation.

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