Toosendanin induces apoptosis in human gastric cancer SGC-7901 cells through mitochondrial and death receptor pathways

Toosendanin (TSN) is a triterpenoid derivative which exerts anti-cancer effects on various cancer cell lines. However, it is still not clear whether TSN has similar anti-cancer effects on gastric cancer. In the present study the effects of TSN on human gastric cancer SGC-7901 cells were investigated by trypan blue exclusion, inverted microscopy, confocal microscopy and flow cytometric analysis. The results show that TSN significantly inhibits the proliferation of SGC-7901 cells in a dose-and time-dependent manner. In addition, TSN induces the formation of apoptotic bodies, increases the apoptosis rate and decreases the mitochondrial membrane potential in the SGC-7901 cells, indicating that TSN can induce apoptosis in gastric cancer cells. Further analysis shows that expression of the genes, Bax, cytochrome c and Fas is increased by TSN, whereas Bcl-2 and PARP expression is reduced. Furthermore, the effects of TSN on activation of caspase-3, caspase-8 and caspase-9 indicate that the mitochondrial and death receptor pathways are involved in the TSN-induced apoptosis. These results suggest that TSN may be an effective candidate agent for treating gastric cancer.