3-O-methylfunicone, a metabolite of Penicillium pinophilum, inhibits proliferation of human melanoma cells by causing G(2) + M arrest and inducing apoptosis

Objectives: Melanoma cells take advantage of impaired ability to undergo programmed cell death in response to different external stimuli and chemotherapeutic drugs; this makes prevention of tumour progression very difficult. The aim of this study was to demonstrate whether 3-O-methylfunicone (OMF), a metabolite of Penicillium pinophilum, has the ability to arrest cell population growth and to induce apoptosis in A375P (parental) and A375M (metastasis derivatived) melanoma cell lines. Materials and methods: Cell proliferation and apoptosis were analysed by flow cytometry, DNA fragmentation, caspase-3 and caspase-9 activation, and PARP-1 cleavage. Results: We demonstrated that OMF affected cell proliferation in a time- and dose-dependent manner, reaching the best effect at concentration of 80 g/ml for 24 h. Flow cytometry revealed that OMF caused significant G2 phase arrest, which was associated with marked decrease in cyclin B1/p34cdc2 complex and p21 induction. OMF also induced marked decrease of survivin expression. Reduced levels of apoptosis were evident after silencing p21 expression in both cell lines. Finally, the effect exercised by OMF on hTERT and TEP-1 gene expression confirmed the ability of this molecule to interfere with replicative ability of cells. Conclusions: The results reported here seem to suggest that OMF as a promising molecule to include in strategies for treatment of melanoma. © 2009 Blackwell Publishing Ltd