Recent published findings have demonstrated the effectiveness of combining molecules from
traditional Chinese medicine with chemotherapeutic drugs to treat
cancer. Combined administration of these agents can overcome drug-mitigating responses as well as reduce adverse side effects, thereby enhancing the efficacy of the
therapy.
Tetramethylpyrazine (
TMP), an
alkaloid monomer from the medicinal herb Ligusticum chuanxiong hort, is known to exert a variety of antitumor effects including inhibition of
tumor cell proliferation,
metastasis, and drug resistance. In this research, we investigated antitumor effects of
TMP combined with
paclitaxel (PTX), a frontline chemotherapeutic drug, in vitro and in vivo. Our results indicate that
TMP enhances the antitumor effects of PTX in
ovarian cancer A2780 and SKOV3 cells. Furthermore, we found that combined treatment of
TMP and PTX suppressed angiogenesis by inhibiting both ERK1/2 and Akt pathways and promoted apoptosis of
tumor cells compared to
TMP or PTX treatment alone. Moreover,
TMP augmented the antitumor effects of PTX in
ovarian cancer A2780 xenograft mouse models by significantly decreasing
tumor burden and partially decreasing the toxicity of PTX, as evidenced by the decreased expression of proliferation and angiogenesis markers as well as the
hematoxylin and
eosin (H&E) staining and biochemical indexes assay. Overall, our findings provide novel mechanistic insight into the efficacy of combining of potent molecules present in
traditional Chinese medicine with chemotherapeutic drugs for therapeutic intervention in
cancer.