Crocetin and Crocin from Saffron in Cancer Chemotherapy and Chemoprevention

Abstract

Introduction: Cancer is a disorder which has a powerful impact on the quality life and life expectancy despite the increase in drugs and treatments available for cancer patients. Moreover, many new therapeutic options are known to have adverse reactions without any improvement in outcome than before. Nowadays, natural products or plant derivatives are used as chemoprevention drugs and chemotherapy is the new approach that uses specific cell premalignant transformation in the malignant form. Natural substances derived from plants, such as polyphenols, flavonoids, carotenoids, alkaloids and others, can be biologically active and have a wide spectrum of effects. The protective effects of Saffron carotenoids (crocin and crocetin) have been extensively studied mainly for their antioxidant properties, however, they have various other biological activities including tumor growth inhibition with the induction of cell death. Methods: The relevant information on Saffron and its carotenoids was collected from scientific databases (such as PubMed, Web of Science, Science Direct). To identify all published articles in relation to saffron, crocin and crocetin, in different types of cancer, no language restriction has been used. Results: To date, crossing the words saffron and cancer, approximately 150 articles can be found. If crossing is made between crocin and cancer, approximately 60 articles can be found. With the crossing between crocetin and cancer, the number is approximately 55, while between carotenoids and cancer, the number exceeds 16.000 reports. In all the papers published to date, there are evidences that saffron and its carotenoids exert chemopreventive activity through anti-oxidant activity, cancer cells apoptosis, inhibition of cell proliferation, enhancement of cell differentiation, modulation of cell cycle progression and cell growth, modulation of tumor metabolism, stimulation of cell-to-cell communication and immune modulation. Conclusion: Here, we have tried to offer an up-to-date overview of pre-clinical experimental investigations on the potential use of the main carotenoids of saffron in tumor models and focus the attention on the molecular mechanisms involved.

Crocetin Extracted from Saffron Shows Antitumor Effects in Models of Human Glioblastoma

“…In recent years, many authors studied the effects of different natural compounds on GBM [22]; among these, SE raised great interest. Crocetin is the major active product of SE and has an elevated capacity to counteract the survival and progression of different cancer types [24,[26][27][28]. However, the effects of crocetin on GBM are poorly understood.…”

“…Previously, we observed that different experimental GBM xenografts were characterized by the presence of heterogeneous populations of tumor and inflammatory cells [9,24] with giant and multinucleated cells that possessed polygonal or spindle morphologies and abundant, intensely eosinophilic cytoplasm and low-stained nuclei. As seen in Figure 5, the U87MG cells in the control group with a high growth ratio were dispersed on a fibrillar collagen background that enveloped the abundant vasculature ( Figure 5A).…”

“…Over recent years, a series of work introduced the effects of different natural compounds on GBM [22,23]. Among these natural agents, a saffron extract (SE) compound named crocetin (CCT) raised significant interest due to its capacity to impair the survival and progression of different cancer types [24,25]. Therefore, we studied the behavior of crocetin using in vitro and in vivo models of glioblastoma for the first time.…”

Genome-Wide Characterization and Analysis of bHLH Transcription Factors Related to Crocin Biosynthesis in Gardenia jasminoides Ellis (Rubiaceae)

“…Crocins have a curative effect on various types of central nervous system diseases, such as neurodegenerative diseases [2], and various types of cardiovascular system disease, such as hypertension [3]. Crocins also have pharmacological activities, including anticancer cell growth [4], anti-inflammation and antioxidation [5], antiplatelet aggregation [6], and antiobesity [7]. G. jasminoides, named Zhi Zi in traditional Chinese medicine and recorded in the Chinese pharmacopoeia, is commonly used for antioxidant activity, anti-inflammation, and detoxification [8].…”

Latest Research On Plants Within No. 5782 - 5829 In Ṣaḥīḥ Al-BukhᾹriy

“…Rados, & Tsarbopoulos, 2019), then the fifth from Italy and Brazil on medicine(Li Puma et al, 2019).The remained five papers which preceded them are originated from European countries and China on different sub-specialty divisions of medicine(Tóth et al, 2019;Colapietro, Mancini, & D'Alessandro, 2019;Yuan, Deng, & Wang, 2018;Christodoulou et al, 2018;Wang et al, 2018).In fact, the top exporter for saffron is Iran, following with Afghanistan, France and Portugal.While the top importers are Spain, Italy, the United Arab Emirates, the United States and Argentina as reported by Product Complexity Index (PCI) (as quoted in OEC, n.d.). Hereby, among contributing countries for the meant ten cutting-edge papers; Iran represents the top providing countries, while Italy represents the top importing countries.…”