The Action of Chinese Medicinal Herbs on Prostate Cancer

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Chinese herbal medicines have been widely used in the world. However, the efficacy and mechanisms of these herbal medicines are not well studied. It is imperative to investigate their efficacy using standardized design, and to elucidate the mechanisms of their action using modern technology. By employing an anti-tumor Chinese herbal formula, ZYD88, the current research proposal is designed to test the hypothesis that ZYD88 induces apoptosis in prostate cancer cells in a xenograft animal model with prostate LNCaP tumor. Cell apoptosis will be determined by assaying caspase-3 activation and CK18, the common early apoptotic events, and DNA fragmentation, a hallmark of cell apoptosis in tumor tissue sections. Furthermore, the release of cytochrome c from mitochondria to cytosol and the cellular levels of Bcl-2 family proteins (Bcl-2, BcI-XL, Bax and Bak), events in apoptotic pathway will be determined by Western blotting analysis. The data will be compared between ZYD88 treated and untreated samples. Dose-response and time-course analyses of ZYD88 action will be performed. These studies will facilitate our understanding of the efficacy and mechanisms of Chinese herbal medicine in cancer therapy, a goal of my career.