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. 2020 Apr 1;21(4):1019-1023.
doi: 10.31557/APJCP.2020.21.4.1019.

Antioxidant Antagonises Chemotherapeutic Drug Effect in Lung Cancer Cell Line A549

Swetha Rajendran  1 , Aishwarya Lakshminarayanan  1 , Gnanasambandan Ramanathan  1 , Suresh Kannan Subramanian Shanmugam  1
Affiliations

Antioxidant Antagonises Chemotherapeutic Drug Effect in Lung Cancer Cell Line A549

Swetha Rajendran et al. Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. .

Abstract

Objective: This study aimed to find whether antioxidants increase or decrease the effect of chemotherapeutic drug in the in vitro model.

Methods: Small lung Cancer cell line (A549) was treated with anticancer drug 6-Thioguanine (6-TG) at different concentration viz., 1, 10, 50 and 100μM and the proliferation was measured using MTT assay. The antioxidant N-Acetyl Cysteine (NAC) in different ratios viz., 1mM, 5mM and 10mM were assayed for their effect in proliferation on the A549 cells alone and in combination with 6-TG.

Results: Our experiment proves that anticancer drug 6-TG decreases the proliferation and the antioxidant NAC enhances the proliferation of A549 cells. Strikingly when co-treated with 6-TG, the antioxidant NAC diminished the proliferation reduction action of 6-TG on A549 cells.

Conclusion: Our results suggest that antioxidants in fact benefit the tumor cell growth when treated alone and when in combination with anticancer drug, it severely impair the activity of the drug. We propose that extreme care should be taken when prescribing antioxidants alone or in combination with chemotherapeutics.

Keywords: A549 cell line; Antioxidant; Lung cancer; chemotherapeutic drug.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Effect of 6-TG on A549 Cell Lines. 6-TG, 6-Thioguanine
Figure 2
Figure 2
a, Effect of NAC on A549 Cell Lines; b, Effect of NAC on CHO cells. NAC, N-Acetyl Cysteine; CHO, Chinese Hamster Ovary
Figure 3
Figure 3
Combinational Effect of 6-TG and NAC. 6-TG, 6-Thioguanine; NAC, N-Acetyl Cysteine
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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