Estudo do potencial anticâncer de substâncias obtidas do zoantídeo Protopalythoa variabilis Duerden, 1898 (Cnidária, Anthozoa) encontrado no litoral cearense

Abstract

Cancer is one of the biggest health problems in all over the world and causes a great amount of death of children and adults. Despite success of several cancer therapies, the ideal anticancer drug is not available yet and the numerous side effects are a limiting point. The natural products research, although recent, has shown often a variety of new chemical structures and potent biological activities. Cytotoxic compounds with possible cancer chemotherapy application are commonly isolated from marine organisms. Two within four marketed drugs from marine sources are used for cancer chemotherapy. Besides small weight molecules, the polysaccharides biological response modifiers also have showing to be a promising field as adjuvant in traditional chemotherapy. Cnidarians together with sponges, ascidians, mollusks and algae form the most promising marine group. The zoanthid Protopalythoa variabilis (Cnidaria, Anthozoa) is found in coastline of whole world, however its pharmacological potential have never been investigated before. The antitumor potential of compounds from P. variabilis from Ceará coast was evaluated in this work. The chemical fractionation guided by the cytotoxicity on four tumor cell lines (HL-60, leukemia; HCT-8, colon; SF-295, central nervous system and MDA-MB-435, melanoma) from crude hydroalcoholic extract yield two new lipidic -amino acids (1a/1b) in mixture from hexane fraction and five fractions (EtOAc-P-1-5) containing sterols signals from ethyl acetate fraction. 1a/1b showed a mean inhibitory concentration mean (IC50) of 85 ng/mL against cell lines tested, whereas EtOAc-P-4, the most powerful of EtOAc derivatives fractions, showed a mean IC50 of 117.5 ng/mL. This was the first report of lipidic amino acids obtained from natural sources and also the first cytotoxic data for this class of compounds. The cytotoxic investigation of 1a/1b and EtOAc-P-4 on HL-60 cells showed treated-cells dead by apoptosis with critical involvement of intrinsic pathway. Protein-bound sulfated polysaccharides (PPV) with high molecular mass were obtained from residue of the hydroalcoholic extract. PPV did not showed cytotoxicity on tumor cell lines in vitro, however it induced 50% of tumor growth inhibition on melanoma B-16 bearing-mice. No toxic evidences were observed in histopathology analysis as well as in biochemical and hematological parameters, however circulating monocytes increased with PPV treatment. In addition peritoneal macrophages investigated in vitro confirmed that PPV is a biological response modifier. The PPV-induced macrophage activation stimulated the release of nitric oxide and cytokines IL-1 and IL-6, but did not do TNF-. This work showed that P. variabilis is a rich source of antitumor compounds, having both small cytotoxic molecules and polysaccharides biological response modifiers with antitumor activity in vivo.