Molecular Targets of Curcumin and Its Therapeutic Potential for Ovarian Cancer

Abstract

Ovarian cancer is the fifth most common gynecological cancer in women globally. Conventional chemotherapy is the first therapeutic approach in the treatment of ovarian cancer, but its success is limited by severe side effects, transient response, and the high prevalence of relapse. Curcumin is a natural product found in the rhizome extract of Curcuma longa and has been extensively used over the last decades for its unique biological and medicinal properties, which include: having antioxidant, analgesic, anti-inflammation, and anti-tumor activities. Curcumin exerts its anticancer properties against ovarian cancer via multiple mechanisms: interfering with cellular interactions necessary for metastasis and recurrence of OC cells, increasing pro-apoptotic proteins as well as inducing or suppressing generation of different molecules such as cytokines, transcription factors, enzymes, protein kinases, and growth factors. Moreover, curcumin down-regulates various signaling pathways such as PI3K/Akt, Wnt/β-catenin, JAK/STAT3, and MEK/ERK1/2 axes, which at least in part have a role in inhibiting further tumor proliferation, growth, and angiogenesis. In this review, we overview the potential of incorporating curcumin into the treatment of ovarian cancer. In particular, we summarize the preclinical evidence supporting its use in combination with current chemotherapeutic regimens as well as new analogues and formulations under investigation.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data Availability Statement

Data sharing not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analyzed during the current study.

Author’s Contribution

A. Bahrami designed the article contents. M. Mohamadian, F. Asgharzadeh and M. Moradi-Binabaj wrote the original manuscript. G.A. Ferns made revisions to the manuscript. All authors discussed the results and contributed to the final manuscript.

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.