The Effect of Cucurbitacin B on the Biological Behavior of Renal Cancer 768-O Cells

Chong Yiran

Abstract：Objective To investigate the effects of cucurbitacin B on proliferation,invasion,metastasis,and autophagy of renal cancer cells,as well as possible cellular pathways.Methods Human renal cancer 768-O cells were cultured and subjected to MTT assay.Firstly,the culture medium was starved overnight and treated with different concentrations of(20,40,60,80 nmol/L)cu-curbitacin B for 48 hours to obtain the optimal concentration of action.Then,different treatment methods were used to divide the cells into control group,cucurbitacin B group,LY294002 group,and cucurbitacin B+LY294002 group.Four treatment methods were used to detect cell proliferation,migration,and invasion ability,including MTT assay,scratch assay,and Transwell assay.The cells were divided into control group,cucurbitacin B group,Akt pathway inhibitor LY294002 group,and cucurbitacin B+LY294002 group;Western Blot assay was used to detect the expression of t-Akt,p-Akt,N-cadherin,EGFR,and LC3-Ⅱ proteins;immu-nofluorescence assay was used to detect cellular autophagy.Results Cucurbitacin B inhibited cell proliferation in a concentration gra-dient;the proliferation,migration,and invasion of cells in the cucurbitacin B group were significantly lower than those in the control group,and autophagy increased(P＜0.01);Western Blot results showed that compared with the control group,the addition of cu-curbitacin B resulted in a decrease in the expression of p-Akt,N-cadherin,and EGFR proteins in the cells,while the expression of LC3-Ⅱ increased(P＜0.01).Conclusion Cucurbitacin B inhibits the proliferation,invasion,and metastasis of renal cancer cells and promotes autophagy by downregulating the expression of EGFR,p-Akt,and N-cadherin in 768-O renal cancer cells.