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L-rhamnose and L-fucose suppress cancer growth in mice

  • Research Article
  • Published:
Central European Journal of Biology

Abstract

It is documented that deficient fucosylation may play an important role in the pathogenesis of cancer. Since the supplementation of L-fucose could restore fucosylation in both in vitro and in vivo conditions, our intent was to examine the effect of intraperitoneal administration of L-fucose and L-rhamnose (a similar deoxysaccharide) on tumour growth, mitotic activity and metastatic setting of a solid form of Ehrlich carcinoma as well as on the survival rate of tumour bearing mice. Both L-fucose and L-rhamnose exerted a significant suppressive effect on tumour growth (P<0.05). After 10 days of therapy, the greatest inhibition of tumour growth expressed as a percentage of controls was observed in L-rhamnose at a dose of 3 g/kg/day (by 62%) and L-fucose at a dose of 5 g/kg/day (by 47%). Moreover, the mitotic index decreased with increasing doses of L-fucose and L-rhamnose. Prolonged survival of tumour bearing mice was observed after 14 consecutive days of daily administering L-rhamnose. Its optimal dose was estimated to be 3.64 g/kg/day. L-Fucose, however, displayed only a slight effect on the survival of the mice. Our results suggest that L-fucose and especially L-rhamnose have anticancer potential. This study is the first to demonstrate the tumour-inhibitory effect of L-rhamnose.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biochemistry, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove, 500 38, Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic

    Pavel Tomsik, Mohamed Niang, Lenka Sucha & Martina Rezacova

  2. Department of Histology and Embryology, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove, 500 387, Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic

    Tomas Soukup

  3. Computer Technology Center, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove, 500 387, Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic

    Eva Cermakova

  4. Department of Pharmacology, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove, 500 387, Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic

    Stanislav Micuda

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  1. Pavel Tomsik
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  2. Tomas Soukup
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Correspondence to Pavel Tomsik.

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Tomsik, P., Soukup, T., Cermakova, E. et al. L-rhamnose and L-fucose suppress cancer growth in mice. cent.eur.j.biol. 6, 1–9 (2011). https://doi.org/10.2478/s11535-010-0087-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/s11535-010-0087-0

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