Bafilomycin Prevented Curcumin-Induced Endoplasmic Reticulum (ER) Stress and Autophagy in MCF-7 Growth Hormone Positive (GH+) Breast Cancer Cells

Autocrine growth hormone (GH) induced cell proliferation, invasion-metastasis and drug resistance in breast cancer cells. Curcumin has an apoptotic effect on colon, melanoma, cervix, and breast cancer cells. Autophagy and endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress are essential cellular processes activated under nutrient deprivation, pathogen infection and drug exposure. Our aim in this study is to investigate the time-dependent effect of curcumin on ER stress and autophagy and potential increase of curcumin efficiency by bafilomycin treatment. Autocrine GH expression triggered resistant profile against curcumin-induced cell viability loss in MCF-7 cells. However, this effect was prevented by the time-dependent manner in MCF-7 cells. In GH+ breast cancer cells bafilomycin increase curcumin-induced cell viability loss by MTT cell viability assay. In conclusion, autocrine GH-triggered curcumin resistance was overcome by autophagy inhibition condition by bafilomycin treatment in a dose-dependent manner in MCF-7 GH+ breast cancer cells