Research Article The Antitumor Activity of Antrodia camphorata in Melanoma Cells: Modulation of Wnt/β-Catenin Signaling Pathways

Copyright © 2012 You-Cheng Hseu et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Antrodia camphorata (AC) is well known in Taiwan as a traditional Chinese medicine. The aim of this study was to investigate whether a fermented culture broth of AC could inhibit melanoma proliferation and progression via suppression of the Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway. In this study, we observed that AC treatment resulted in decreased cell viability and disturbed Wnt/β-catenin cascade in B16F10 and/or B16F1 melanoma cells. This result was accompanied by a decrease in the expression of Wnt/β-catenin transcriptional targets, including c-Myc and survivin. Furthermore, treatment of melanoma cells with AC resulted in a significant increase in apoptosis, which was associated with DNA fragmentation, cytochrome c release, caspase-9 and-3 activation, PARP degradation, Bcl-2/Bax dysregulation, and p53 expression. We also observed that AC caused G1 phase arrest mediated by a downregulation of cyclin D1 and CDK4 and increased p21 and p27 expression. In addition, we demonstrated that non- and subcytotoxic concentrations of ACmarkedly inhibitedmigration and invasion of highlymetastatic B16F10 cells. The antimetastati