Curcumin suppresses epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition and metastasis of pancreatic cancer cells by inhibiting cancer-associated fibroblasts

Abstract Pancreatic cancer is one of the most lethal malignancies and the fourth leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide, because of its aggressive and highly metastatic ability even in its early stages. Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) have been reported to be vital to pancreatic cancer progression via regulating tumorigenesis and metastasis. Studies have shown that CAFs also mediate epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) in tumor cells. Curcumin has recently been reported to have anticancer effects by modulating pathways involved in cancer progression. Therefore, we hypothesized that curcumin might inhibit EMT by targeting CAFs in pancreatic cancer. In this study, we show that the CAF-mediated enhancement of pancreatic cancer cell migration and metastasis was blocked by curcumin. In conclusion, our data provide the first evidence that curcumin inhibits the migration and metastasis of pancreatic cancer cells by reducing the mesenchymal characteristics of CAFs, which reverses the EMT phenotypes of pancreatic cancer cells.