Paper Title
IN-VITRO AND IN-VIVO ANTICANCER EFFECTS OF SOLANUM NIGRUM WATER EXTRACT IN CANCER CELLS AND XENOGRAFT MICE MODEL OF BREAST CANCER

Abstract
Breast cancer is the most progressive cancer among women. The currently available chemotherapeutic agents cause severe unacceptable adverse effects in breast cancer patients. In this context, natural medicinal herbs gain importance to find non-toxic, effective anticancer drugs. Solanum nigrum is one of the major medicinal plants used in traditional medicine for treating various diseases. This study investigated the anticancer effect of Solanum nigrum water extract (SNWE) against breast cancer cell lines and xenograft cancer model in mice. The IC50 value for SNWE was found that 4.26 µg/ml in MCF-7 and 5.30 µg/ml in MDA-MB-231 cells. SNWE induced oxidative stress and apoptotic cell death in a concentration-dependent manner. Real-Time PCR results illustrated the upregulation of pro-apoptotic genes and downregulation of anti-apoptotic genes upon SNWE treatment in MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231 cell lines and the apoptotic markers like p53, Caspase3 and BAX expressions were increased in the SNWE treatment. The results of in-vivo study showed significant reduction of tumor volume in mice treated with SNWE or tamoxifen while the combination therapy was found to be more effective than their individual effects. Further studies are warranted to investigate the optimum doses of Solanum nigrum and tamoxifen adjuvant therapy for cancer treatment without causing any adverse side effects. (This research was funded by the National Plan for Science, Technology and Innovation (MAARIFAH), King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia; Award No. 2-17-03-001-0044).