Osteosarcoma is a very common type of malignant bone
tumor in children and young adults and aberrant activation of Wnt/β-
catenin signaling pathway has been discovered in
osteosarcoma. The
traditional Chinese medicine baicalein was proved to have anti-proliferative and anti-metastatic properties in
osteosarcoma, but the mechanism remained poorly understood. In the present study, we assessed the effects of
baicalein on
osteosarcoma and detected the potential molecular mechanism. We found that
baicalein significantly suppressed the proliferation of
osteosarcoma cells in a concentration- and time-dependent manner. In additional,
baicalein could induce apoptosis and cell cycle arrest and reduce cell motility. Moreover, the level of β-
catenin and its target genes, including c-myc, cyclinD1, and
survivin significantly decreased in
baicalein-treated
osteosarcoma cells, whereas exogenous expression of β-
catenin could reverse the anti-proliferative and anti-metastatic effects of
baicalein. Subsequently, we established a 143B xenograft
tumor model and found that
baicalein treatment significantly inhibited
tumor growth accompanied with inhibiting Wnt/β-
catenin pathway. Thus, these findings suggest that
baicalein may be a potentially effective Chinese herbal medicine for
therapeutics of
osteosarcoma and Wnt/β-
catenin signaling pathway may serve as an efficient molecular marker or predictive target for
osteosarcoma.