Chemical composition and anti-hepatoma effect of Annona squamosa L. pericarp oil

Abstract

In this study, an optimal method used to extract Annona squamosa pericarp oil (ASPO) was established according to the response surface model. The yield of ASPO was 1.45%. 8 fatty acids were identified from ASPO by GC-MS. Among them, (9Z)-9-Octadecenoic acid was abundant and accounted for 49.65%. The anti-hepatoma activities of ASPO were investigated against SMMC-7721 cell line in vitro and H₂₂ cell line in vivo. Proteins associated with apoptosis in tumour tissue were quantified by western blot assay. The result revealed that ASPO had significant anti-hepatoma activities with IC₅₀ value of 15.96 μg/mL in vitro and tumour inhibition rate of 54.14% at 50 mg/kg dose in vivo. Protein analysis showed that ASPO activated apoptosis by down-regulating Bcl-2, up-regulating Bax, cleaving caspase 9, cleaving caspase 8 and cleaving caspase 3 proteins. The possible mechanisms of apoptosis induced by ASPO were related to Fas/FasL/caspase-8/caspase-3 and Bcl-2/bax/caspase-9/caspase-3 pathways.

Graphical Abstract

Keywords:

• Annona squamosa L.
• oil
• GC-MS
• anti-hepatoma
• apoptosis

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to Yan Hu and Xiao-chen Peng for their help with the biological assays.

Disclosure statement

No conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant number 81573577, 81403082 and 81274057 and Natural Science Foundation of Taizhou Polytechnic College under Grant number 1821819051.