Trabectedin and plitidepsin: drugs from the sea that strike the tumor microenvironment

A review on marine source as anticancer agents

This review investigates the potential of natural compounds obtained from marine sources for the treatment of cancer. The oceans are believed to contain physiologically active compounds, such as alkaloids, nucleosides, macrolides, and polyketides, which have shown promising effects in slowing human tumor cells both in vivo and in vitro. Various marine species, including algae, mollusks, actinomycetes, fungi, sponges, and soft corals, have been studied for their bioactive metabolites with diverse chemical structures. The review explores the therapeutic potential of various marine-derived substances and discusses their possible applications in cancer treatment.

Dankasterone A induces prostate cancer cell death by inducing oxidative stress

Oxidative stress plays a dual role in tumor survival, either promoting tumor development or killing tumor cells under different conditions. Dankasterone A is a secondary metabolite derived from the fungus Talaromyces purpurogenu. It showed good potential in a screen for anti-prostate cancer compounds. In this study, MTT results showed dankasterone A was cytotoxic to prostate cancer cells, with an IC50 of 5.10 μM for PC-3 cells and 3.41 μM for 22Rv1 cells. Further studies, plate cloning assays and real-time cell analysis monitoring showed that dankasterone A significantly inhibited clonal colony formation and cell migration in 22Rv1 and PC-3 cells. In addition, flow cytometry results showed that dankasterone A induced apoptosis in prostate cancer cells while having no impact on cell cycle distribution. At the molecular level, Protein microarray experiments and western blot assays revealed that dankasterone A specifically and dramatically upregulated HO-1 protein expression; and the results of cell fluorescence staining showed that dankasterone A induced overexpression of reactive oxygen species in 22Rv1 and PC-3 cells. Taken together, dankasterone A induced prostate cancer cells to undergo intense oxidative stress, which resulted in the production of large amounts of HO-1 and the release of large amounts of reactive oxygen species, leading to apoptosis of prostate cancer cells, ultimately resulting in the inhibition of both cell proliferation and migration. We also validated the anti-prostate cancer effects of dankasterone A in vivo in a zebrafish xenograft tumor model. In conclusion, dankasterone A has the potential to be developed as an anti-prostate cancer drug.

Reptiles as Promising Sources of Medicinal Natural Products for Cancer Therapeutic Drugs

Natural products have historically played an important role as a source of therapeutic drugs for various diseases, and the development of medicinal natural products is still a field with high potential. Although diverse drugs have been developed for incurable diseases for several decades, discovering safe and efficient anticancer drugs remains a formidable challenge. Reptiles, as one source of Asian traditional medicines, are known to possess anticancer properties and have been used for a long time without a clarified scientific background. Recently, it has been reported that extracts, crude peptides, sera, and venom isolated from reptiles could effectively inhibit the survival and proliferation of various cancer cells. In this article, we summarize recent studies applying ingredients derived from reptiles in cancer therapy and discuss the difficulties and prospective development of natural product research.

Does the Use of Peripheral Immune-Related Markers Indicate Whether to Administer Pazopanib, Trabectedin, or Eribulin to Advanced Soft Tissue Sarcoma Patients?

Pazopanib, trabectedin, and eribulin are administered for the treatment of soft tissue sarcomas (STSs); however, there is little consensus on which agent should be preferentially used in a clinical setting. This study assessed whether peripheral immune-related markers served as a useful reference when selecting pazopanib, trabectedin, or eribulin. This study included 63 patients who were administered pazopanib, trabectedin, or eribulin for advanced STSs between March 2015 and December 2020. Patients were divided into three groups based on the first drug administered among these three drugs. Differences in overall survival (OS) or progression-free survival (PFS) among the three groups were analyzed. OS showed no significant differences among the drugs administered first. For patients with low neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), the OS of patients administered pazopanib as the first choice was shorter than the others (hazard ratio [HR] = 9.53, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.94–18.13, p = 0.0018). In the low platelet-to-lymphocyte ratio (PLR) subgroup, the OS of the patients administered eribulin for the first choice was longer than that of the others (HR = 0.32, 95%CI = 0.10–0.98, p = 0.046). Therefore, NLR and PLR might be used as prognostic indicators to dictate whether STS patients receive pazopanib, trabectedin, or eribulin.

Marine Power on Cancer: Drugs, Lead Compounds, and Mechanisms

Worldwide, 19.3 million new cancer cases and almost 10.0 million cancer deaths occur each year. Recently, much attention has been paid to the ocean, the largest biosphere of the earth that harbors a great many different organisms and natural products, to identify novel drugs and drug candidates to fight against malignant neoplasms. The marine compounds show potent anticancer activity in vitro and in vivo, and relatively few drugs have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of metastatic malignant lymphoma, breast cancer, or Hodgkin's disease. This review provides a summary of the anticancer effects and mechanisms of action of selected marine compounds, including cytarabine, eribulin, marizomib, plitidepsin, trabectedin, zalypsis, adcetris, and OKI-179. The future development of anticancer marine drugs requires innovative biochemical biology approaches and introduction of novel therapeutic targets, as well as efficient isolation and synthesis of marine-derived natural compounds and derivatives.

Influence of tumor-infiltrating immune cells on local control rate, distant metastasis, and survival in patients with soft tissue sarcoma

Soft tissue sarcomas (STS) are considered non-immunogenic, although distinct entities respond to anti-tumor agents targeting the tumor microenvironment. This study’s aims were to investigate relationships between tumor-infiltrating immune cells and patient/tumor-related factors, and assess their prognostic value for local recurrence (LR), distant metastasis (DM), and overall survival (OS).

One-hundred-eighty-eight STS-patients (87 females [46.3%]; median age: 62.5 years) were retrospectively analyzed. Tissue microarrays (in total 1266 cores) were stained with multiplex immunohistochemistry and analyzed with multispectral imaging. Seven cell types were differentiated depending on marker profiles (CD3+, CD3+ CD4+ helper, CD3+ CD8+ cytotoxic, CD3+ CD4+ CD45RO+ helper memory, CD3+ CD8+ CD45RO+ cytotoxic memory T-cells; CD20 + B-cells; CD68+ macrophages). Correlations between phenotype abundance and variables were analyzed. Uni- and multivariate Fine&Gray and Cox-regression models were constructed to investigate prognostic variables. Model calibration was assessed with C-index. IHC-findings were validated with TCGA-SARC gene expression data of genes specific for macrophages, T- and B-cells.

B-cell percentage was lower in patients older than 62.5 years (p = .013), whilst macrophage percentage was higher (p = .002). High B-cell (p = .035) and macrophage levels (p = .003) were associated with increased LR-risk in the univariate analysis. In the multivariate setting, high macrophage levels (p = .014) were associated with increased LR-risk, irrespective of margins, age, gender or B-cells. Other immune cells were not associated with outcome events.

High macrophage levels were a poor prognostic factor for LR, irrespective of margins, B-cells, gender and age. Thus, anti-tumor, macrophage-targeting agents may be applied more frequently in tumors with enhanced macrophage infiltration.

Marine Anticancer Agents: An Overview with a Particular Focus on Their Chemical Classes

The marine environment is a rich source of biologically active molecules for the treatment of human diseases, especially cancer. The adaptation to unique environmental conditions led marine organisms to evolve different pathways than their terrestrial counterparts, thus producing unique chemicals with a broad diversity and complexity. So far, more than 36,000 compounds have been isolated from marine micro- and macro-organisms including but not limited to fungi, bacteria, microalgae, macroalgae, sponges, corals, mollusks and tunicates, with hundreds of new marine natural products (MNPs) being discovered every year. Marine-based pharmaceuticals have started to impact modern pharmacology and different anti-cancer drugs derived from marine compounds have been approved for clinical use, such as: cytarabine, vidarabine, nelarabine (prodrug of ara-G), fludarabine phosphate (pro-drug of ara-A), trabectedin, eribulin mesylate, brentuximab vedotin, polatuzumab vedotin, enfortumab vedotin, belantamab mafodotin, plitidepsin, and lurbinectedin. This review focuses on the bioactive molecules derived from the marine environment with anticancer activity, discussing their families, origin, structural features and therapeutic use.

Blue-Print Autophagy in 2020: A Critical Review

Autophagy is an elegant and complex biological process that has recently attracted much attention from the scientific community. The compounds which are capable of control and modulation of this process have a promising potential as therapeutics for a number of pathological conditions, including cancer and neurodegenerative disorders. At the same time, due to the relatively young age of the field, there are still some pitfalls in the autophagy monitoring assays and interpretation of the experimental data. This critical review provides an overview of the marine natural compounds, which have been reported to affect autophagy. The time period from the beginning of 2016 to the middle of 2020 is covered. Additionally, the published data and conclusions based on the experimental results are re-analyzed with regard to the guidelines developed by Klionsky and colleagues (Autophagy. 2016; 12(1): 1–222), which are widely accepted by the autophagy research community. Remarkably and surprisingly, more than half of the compounds reported to be autophagy activators or inhibitors could not ultimately be assigned to either category. The experimental data reported for those substances could indicate both autophagy activation and inhibition, requiring further investigation. Thus, the reviewed molecules were divided into two groups: having validated and non-validated autophagy modulatory effects. This review gives an analysis of the recent updates in the field and raises an important problem of standardization in the experimental design and data interpretation.

Time lapse analysis of tumor response in patients with soft tissue sarcoma treated with trabectedin: A pooled analysis of two phase II clinical trials

The time course of the response to each drug is important to avoid inappropriate termination of treatment by misjudging tumor progression; however, little is known about soft tissue sarcoma (STS) regarding this matter. This study aimed to perform a time-lapse analysis of tumor response in patients with STS treated with trabectedin from 2 phase II clinical trials. We examined 66 patients with translocation-related sarcoma registered in 2 Japanese phase II clinical trials. All patients previously received standard therapy before the administration of trabectedin at 1.2 mg/m² every 3 weeks. Imaging evaluation was performed according to the study protocol. The sum of the maximum diameters of the target lesions was calculated and analyzed over time. Among the 66 patients, 9 (13.6%) showed partial response (PR) to trabectedin. Histological diagnoses of these 9 responders comprised 6 myxoid liposarcoma, 2 synovial sarcoma, and a mesenchymal chondrosarcoma. The median period from treatment initiation to the first PR was 123 (range, 34-328) days. The pattern of tumor response to trabectedin showed an increasing tendency in size in the initial stage, usually followed by a size decrease with repeated administration. STS response to trabectedin was characterized as delayed and potentially persistent. Clinicians treating STS with trabectedin should know the features of the response pattern to avoid interrupting the treatment before maximal efficacy is achieved.

Enriching cancer pharmacology with drugs of marine origin

Marine natural products have proven, over the last half-century, to be effective biological modulators. These molecules have revealed new targets for cancer therapy as well as dissimilar modes of action within typical classes of drugs. In this scenario, innovation from marine-based pharmaceuticals has helped advance cancer chemotherapy in many aspects, as most of these are designated as first-in-class drugs. Here, by examining the path from discovery to development of clinically approved drugs of marine origin for cancer treatment-cytarabine (Cytosar-U®), trabectedin (Yondelis®), eribulin (Halaven®), brentuximab vedotin (Adcetris®), and plitidepsin (Aplidin®)- together with those in late clinical trial phases-lurbinectedin, plinabulin, marizomib, and plocabulin-the present review offers a critical analysis of the contributions given by these new compounds to cancer pharmacotherapy.

A Systematic Review of Recently Reported Marine Derived Natural Product Kinase Inhibitors

Protein kinases are validated drug targets for a number of therapeutic areas, as kinase deregulation is known to play an essential role in many disease states. Many investigated protein kinase inhibitors are natural product small molecules or their derivatives. Many marine-derived natural products from various marine sources, such as bacteria and cyanobacteria, fungi, animals, algae, soft corals, sponges, etc. have been found to have potent kinase inhibitory activity, or desirable pharmacophores for further development. This review covers the new compounds reported from the beginning of 2014 through the middle of 2019 as having been isolated from marine organisms and having potential therapeutic applications due to kinase inhibitory and associated bioactivities. Moreover, some existing clinical drugs based on marine-derived natural product scaffolds are also discussed.

Marine-Derived Anticancer Agents: Clinical Benefits, Innovative Mechanisms, and New Targets

The role of the marine environment in the development of anticancer drugs has been widely reviewed, particularly in recent years. However, the innovation in terms of clinical benefits has not been duly emphasized, although there are important breakthroughs associated with the use of marine-derived anticancer agents that have altered the current paradigm in chemotherapy. In addition, the discovery and development of marine drugs has been extremely rewarding with significant scientific gains, such as the discovery of new anticancer mechanisms of action as well as novel molecular targets. Approximately 50 years since the approval of cytarabine, the marine-derived anticancer pharmaceutical pipeline includes four approved drugs and eighteen agents in clinical trials, six of which are in late development. Thus, the dynamic pharmaceutical pipeline consisting of approved and developmental marine-derived anticancer agents offers new hopes and new tools in the treatment of patients afflicted with previously intractable types of cancer.

Algae metabolites: from in vitro growth inhibitory effects to promising anticancer activity

Covering: 1957 to 2017 Algae constitute a heterogeneous group of eukaryotic photosynthetic organisms, mainly found in the marine environment. Algae produce numerous metabolites that help them cope with the harsh conditions of the marine environment. Because of their structural diversity and uniqueness, these molecules have recently gained a lot of interest for the identification of medicinally useful agents, including those with potential anticancer activities. In the current review, which is not a catalogue-based one, we first highlight the major biological events that lead to various types of cancer, including metastatic ones, to chemoresistance, thus to any types of current anticancer treatment relating to the use of chemotherapeutics. We then review algal metabolites for which scientific literature reports anticancer activity. Lastly, we focus on algal metabolites with promising anticancer activity based on their ability to target biological characteristics of cancer cells responsible for poor treatment outcomes. Thus, we highlight compounds that have, among others, one or more of the following characteristics: selectivity in reducing the proliferation of cancer cells over normal ones, potential for killing cancer cells through non-apoptotic signaling pathways, ability to circumvent MDR-related efflux pumps, and activity in vivo in relevant pre-clinical models.

Trabectedin Inhibits EWS-FLI1 and Evicts SWI/SNF from Chromatin in a Schedule-dependent Manner

PURPOSE

The successful clinical translation of compounds that target specific oncogenic transcription factors will require an understanding of the mechanism of target suppression to optimize the dose and schedule of administration. We have previously shown trabectedin reverses the gene signature of the EWS-FLI1 transcription factor. In this report, we establish the mechanism of suppression and use it to justify the reevaluation of this drug in the clinic in patients with Ewing sarcoma.Experimental Design: We demonstrate a novel epigenetic mechanism of trabectedin using biochemical fractionation and chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing. We link the effect to drug schedule and EWS-FLI1 downstream target expression using confocal microscopy, qPCR, Western blot analysis, and cell viability assays. Finally, we quantitate target suppression within the three-dimensional architecture of the tumor in vivo using ¹⁸F-FLT imaging.

RESULTS

Trabectedin evicts the SWI/SNF chromatin-remodeling complex from chromatin and redistributes EWS-FLI1 in the nucleus leading to a marked increase in H3K27me3 and H3K9me3 at EWS-FLI1 target genes. These effects only occur at high concentrations of trabectedin leading to suppression of EWS-FLI1 target genes and a loss of cell viability. In vivo, low-dose irinotecan is required to improve the magnitude, penetrance, and duration of target suppression in the three-dimensional architecture of the tumor leading to differentiation of the Ewing sarcoma xenograft into benign mesenchymal tissue.

CONCLUSIONS

These data provide the justification to evaluate trabectedin in the clinic on a short infusion schedule in combination with low-dose irinotecan with ¹⁸F-FLT PET imaging in patients with Ewing sarcoma.

Starvation tactics using natural compounds for advanced cancers: pharmacodynamics, clinical efficacy, and predictive biomarkers

The high mortality associated with oncological diseases is mostly due to tumors in advanced stages, and their management is a major challenge in modern oncology. Angiogenesis is a defined hallmark of cancer and predisposes to metastatic invasion and dissemination and is therefore an important druggable target for cancer drug discovery. Recently, because of drug resistance and poor prognosis, new anticancer drugs from natural sources targeting tumor vessels have attracted more attention and have been used in several randomized and controlled clinical trials as therapeutic options. Here, we outline and discuss potential natural compounds as salvage treatment for advanced cancers from recent and ongoing clinical trials and real-world studies. We also discuss predictive biomarkers for patients' selection to optimize the use of these potential anticancer drugs.

Marine Mollusk-Derived Agents with Antiproliferative Activity as Promising Anticancer Agents to Overcome Chemotherapy Resistance

The chemical investigation of marine mollusks has led to the isolation of a wide variety of bioactive metabolites, which evolved in marine organisms as favorable adaptations to survive in different environments. Most of them are derived from food sources, but they can be also biosynthesized de novo by the mollusks themselves, or produced by symbionts. Consequently, the isolated compounds cannot be strictly considered as "chemotaxonomic markers" for the different molluscan species. However, the chemical investigation of this phylum has provided many compounds of interest as potential anticancer drugs that assume particular importance in the light of the growing literature on cancer biology and chemotherapy. The current review highlights the diversity of chemical structures, mechanisms of action, and, most importantly, the potential of mollusk-derived metabolites as anticancer agents, including those biosynthesized by mollusks and those of dietary origin. After the discussion of dolastatins and kahalalides, compounds previously studied in clinical trials, the review covers potentially promising anticancer agents, which are grouped based on their structural type and include terpenes, steroids, peptides, polyketides and nitrogen-containing compounds. The "promise" of a mollusk-derived natural product as an anticancer agent is evaluated on the basis of its ability to target biological characteristics of cancer cells responsible for poor treatment outcomes. These characteristics include high antiproliferative potency against cancer cells in vitro, preferential inhibition of the proliferation of cancer cells over normal ones, mechanism of action via nonapoptotic signaling pathways, circumvention of multidrug resistance phenotype, and high activity in vivo, among others. The review also includes sections on the targeted delivery of mollusk-derived anticancer agents and solutions to their procurement in quantity.

Assessing the anticancer effects associated with food products and/or nutraceuticals using in vitro and in vivo preclinical development-related pharmacological tests

This review is part of a special issue entitled "Role of dietary pattern, foods, nutrients and nutraceuticals in supporting cancer prevention and treatment" and describes a pharmacological strategy to determine the potential contribution of food-related components as anticancer agents against established cancer. Therefore, this review does not relate to chemoprevention, which is analysed in several other reviews in the current special issue, but rather focuses on the following: i) the biological events that currently represent barriers against the treatment of certain types of cancers, primarily metastatic cancers; ii) the in vitro and in vivo pharmacological pre-clinical tests that can be used to analyse the potential anticancer effects of food-related components; and iii) several examples of food-related components with anticancer effects. This review does not represent a catalogue-based listing of food-related components with more or less anticancer activity. By contrast, this review proposes an original pharmacological strategy that researchers can use to analyse the potential anticancer activity of any food-related component-e.g., by considering the crucial characteristics of cancer biological aggressiveness. This review also highlights that cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy should restrict the use of "food complements" without supervision by a medical nutritionist. By contrast, an equilibrated diet that includes the food-related components listed herein would be beneficial for cancer patients who are not undergoing chemotherapy.

Marine Antibody-Drug Conjugates: Design Strategies and Research Progress

Antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), constructed with monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), linkers, and natural cytotoxins, are innovative drugs developed for oncotherapy. Owing to the distinctive advantages of both chemotherapy drugs and antibody drugs, ADCs have obtained enormous success during the past several years. The development of highly specific antibodies, novel marine toxins' applications, and innovative linker technologies all accelerate the rapid R&D of ADCs. Meanwhile, some challenges remain to be solved for future ADCs. For instance, varieties of site-specific conjugation have been proposed for solving the inhomogeneity of DARs (Drug Antibody Ratios). In this review, the usages of various natural toxins, especially marine cytotoxins, and the development strategies for ADCs in the past decade are summarized. Representative ADCs with marine cytotoxins in the pipeline are introduced and characterized with their new features, while perspective comments for future ADCs are proposed.

Blue-Print Autophagy: Potential for Cancer Treatment

The marine environment represents a very rich source of biologically active compounds with pharmacological applications. This is due to its chemical richness, which is claiming considerable attention from the health science communities. In this review we give a general overview on the marine natural products involved in stimulation and inhibition of autophagy (a type of programmed cell death) linked to pharmacological and pathological conditions. Autophagy represents a complex multistep cellular process, wherein a double membrane vesicle (the autophagosome) captures organelles and proteins and delivers them to the lysosome. This natural and destructive mechanism allows the cells to degrade and recycle its cellular components, such as amino acids, monosaccharides, and lipids. Autophagy is an important mechanism used by cells to clear pathogenic organism and deal with stresses. Therefore, it has also been implicated in several diseases, predominantly in cancer. In fact, pharmacological stimulation or inhibition of autophagy have been proposed as approaches to develop new therapeutic treatments of cancers. In conclusion, this blue-print autophagy (so defined because it is induced and/or inhibited by marine natural products) represents a new strategy for the future of biomedicine and of biotechnology in cancer treatment.

Recent advances in isolation, synthesis, and evaluation of bioactivities of bispyrroloquinone alkaloids of marine origin

The ocean continues to provide a plethora of unique scaffolds capable of remarkable biological applications. A large number of pyrroloiminoquinone alkaloids, including discorhabdins, epinardins, batzellines, makaluvamines, and veiutamine, have been isolated from various marine organisms. A class of pyrroloiminoquinone-related alkaloids, known as bispyrroloquinones, is the focus of this review article. This family of marine alkaloids, which contain an aryl substituted bispyrroloquinone ring system, includes three subclasses of alkaloids namely, wakayin, tsitsikammamines A-B, and zyzzyanones A-D. Both wakayin and the tsitsikammamines contain a tetracyclic fused bispyrroloiminoquinone ring system, while zyzzyanones contain a fused tricyclic bispyrroloquinone ring system. The unique chemical structures of these marine natural products and their diverse biological properties, including antifungal and antimicrobial activity, as well as the potent, albeit generally nonspecific and universal cytotoxicities, have attracted great interest of synthetic chemists over the past three decades. Tsitsikammamines, wakayin, and several of their analogs show inhibition of topoisomerases. One additional possible mechanism of anticancer activity of tsitsikammamines analogs that has been discovered recently is through the inhibition of indoleamine 2, 3-dioxygenase, an enzyme involved in tumoral immune resistance. This review discusses the isolation, synthesis, and evaluation of bioactivities of bispyrroloquinone alkaloids and their analogs.

The marine triterpene glycoside frondoside A exhibits activity in vitro and in vivo in prostate cancer

Despite recent advances in the treatment of metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), outcome of patients remains poor due to the development of drug resistance. Thus, new drugs are urgently needed. We investigated efficacy, toxicity and mechanism of action of marine triterpene glycoside frondoside A (FrA) using CRPC cell lines in vitro and in vivo. FrA revealed high efficacy in human prostate cancer cells, while non-malignant cells were less sensitive. Remarkably, proliferation and colony formation of cells resistant to enzalutamide and abiraterone (due to the androgen receptor splice variant AR-V7) were also significantly inhibited by FrA. The marine compound caused cell type specific cell cycle arrest and induction of caspase-dependent or -independent apoptosis. Up-regulation or induction of several pro-apoptotic proteins (Bax, Bad, PTEN), cleavage of PARP and caspase-3 and down-regulation of anti-apoptotic proteins (survivin and Bcl-2) were detected in treated cells. Global proteome analysis revealed regulation of proteins involved in formation of metastases, tumor cell invasion, and apoptosis, like keratin 81, CrkII, IL-1β and cathepsin B. Inhibition of pro-survival autophagy was observed following FrA exposure. In vivo, FrA inhibited tumor growth of PC-3 and DU145 cells with a notable reduction of lung metastasis, as well as circulating tumor cells in the peripheral blood. Increased lymphocyte counts of treated animals might indicate an immune modulating effect of FrA. In conclusion, our results suggest that FrA is a promising new drug for the treatment of mCRPC. Induction of apoptosis, inhibition of pro-survival autophagy, and immune modulatory effects are suspected modes of actions.

Synergistic Effect of Trabectedin and Olaparib Combination Regimen in Breast Cancer Cell Lines

Purpose

Trabectedin induces synthetic lethality in tumor cells carrying defects in homologous recombinant DNA repair. We evaluated the effect of concomitant inhibition of nucleotide-excision repair and poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) activity with trabectedin and PARP inhibitors, respectively, and whether the synthetic lethality effect had the potential for a synergistic effect in breast cancer cell lines. Additionally, we investigated if this approach remained effective in BRCA1-positive breast tumor cells.

Methods

We have evaluated the in vitro synergistic effect of combinations of trabectedin and three different PARP inhibitors (veliparib, olaparib, and iniparib) in four breast cancer cell lines, each presenting a different BRCA1 genetic background. Antiproliferative activity, DNA damage, cell cycle perturbations and poly(ADP-ribosyl)ation were assessed by MTT assay, comet assay, flow cytometry and western blot, respectively.

Results

The combination of trabectedin and olaparib was synergistic in all the breast cancer cell lines tested. Our data indicated that the synergy persisted regardless of the BRCA1 status of the tumor cells. Combination treatment was associated with a strong accumulation of double-stranded DNA breaks, G2/M arrest, and apoptotic cell death. Synergistic effects were not observed when trabectedin was combined with veliparib or iniparib.

Conclusion

Collectively, our results indicate that the combination of trabectedin and olaparib induces an artificial synthetic lethality effect that can be used to kill breast cancer cells, independent of BRCA1 status.

Marine alkaloid Monanchocidin a overcomes drug resistance by induction of autophagy and lysosomal membrane permeabilization

Monanchocidin A (MonA) is a novel alkaloid recently isolated from the marine sponge Monanchora pulchra. The compound reveals cytotoxic activity in genitourinary cancers including cisplatin-sensitive and -resistant germ cell tumor (GCT) cell lines, hormone-sensitive and castration-resistant prostate carcinoma cell lines and different bladder carcinoma cell lines. In contrast, non-malignant cells were significantly less sensitive. MonA is highly synergistic with cisplatin in GCT cells. Induction of autophagy at lower and lysosomal membrane permeabilization (LMP) at higher concentrations were identified as the dominating modes of action. Cytotoxicity and protein degradation could be inhibited by 3-methyladenine, an inhibitor of autophagy. LMP was confirmed by loss of acridine orange staining of lysosoms and by release of cathepsin B. In conclusion, MonA exerts cytotoxic activity by mechanisms different from "classical" apoptosis, and could be a promising new compound to overcome resistance to standard therapies in genitourinary malignancies.

Trabectedin in soft tissue sarcomas

Soft tissue sarcomas are a group of rare tumors derived from mesenchymal tissue, accounting for about 1% of adult cancers. There are over 60 different histological subtypes, each with their own unique biological behavior and response to systemic therapy. The outcome for patients with metastatic soft tissue sarcoma is poor with few available systemic treatment options. For decades, the mainstay of management has consisted of doxorubicin with or without ifosfamide. Trabectedin is a synthetic agent derived from the Caribbean tunicate, Ecteinascidia turbinata. This drug has a number of potential mechanisms of action, including binding the DNA minor groove, interfering with DNA repair pathways and the cell cycle, as well as interacting with transcription factors. Several phase II trials have shown that trabectedin has activity in anthracycline and alkylating agent-resistant soft tissue sarcoma and suggest use in the second- and third-line setting. More recently, trabectedin has shown similar progression-free survival to doxorubicin in the first-line setting and significant activity in liposarcoma and leiomyosarcoma subtypes. Trabectedin has shown a favorable toxicity profile and has been approved in over 70 countries for the treatment of metastatic soft tissue sarcoma. This manuscript will review the development of trabectedin in soft tissue sarcomas.

Trabectedin, a drug acting on both cancer cells and the tumour microenvironment

Trabectedin is the first marine-derived anti-neoplastic drug approved for the treatment of advanced soft tissue sarcoma and, in combination with pegylated liposomal doxorubicin, for the treatment of patients with relapsed platinum-sensitive ovarian cancer. From the beginning of its development, trabectedin showed some peculiar properties that clearly distinguished it from other anti-cancer drugs. In this mini-review, we will outline the current state of knowledge regarding the mode of action of trabectedin, which appears to represent a new class of anti-neoplastic drugs acting both on cancer cells and on the tumour microenvironment.

Natural product and natural product derived drugs in clinical trials

The 25 Natural Product (NP)-derived drugs launched since 2008 and the 100 NP-derived compounds and 33 Antibody Drug Conjugates (ADCs) in clinical trials or in registration at the end of 2013 are reviewed.