synergistic effect of pomolic acid inducing apoptosis on doxorubicin resistant human gastric carcinoma cells

Doxorubicin resistance is one of chemotherapeutic failure in cancers. Pomolic Acid (PA), a pentacyclic triterpene inducing apoptotic cell death, has been suggested to overcome multi-drug resistance. However, the probability of PA as an agent to overcome doxorubicin resistance was not investigated. The present study investigated the synergistic effects of PA on doxorubicin-resistant human gastric carcinoma SNU-620-DOX cells. Co-treatment with PA and doxorubicin decreased the viability of SNU-620-DOX cells, compared with only PA- or doxorubicin-treated cells. Co-treatment with PA and doxorubicin induced the activation of caspase cascade, but this was not observed in SNU-620-DOX cells treated with only PA- or doxorubicin-treated cells. While the expression of anti-apoptotic protein Bcl-2 and Bcl-xL was not affected by the presence of PA. PA increased the loss of mitochondrial membrane potential in doxorubicin-treated SNU-620-DOX cells. In conclusion, our results indicated that co-treatment with PA and doxorubicin induced apoptosis in doxorubicin-resistant human gastric carcinoma cells, which is mediated by increasing the loss of mitochondrial membrane potential. Keywords: Apoptosis; Doxorubicin-Resistant; Gastric Carcinoma Cells; SNU-620-DOX; Mitochondrial Membrane Potential (â–³Ψm)