Skip to main content
. 2021 Mar 27;12(2):15–37. doi: 10.4331/wjbc.v12.i2.15

Table 4.

Marine compounds with potential anticancer activity and chemotherapeutics against breast cancer

Marine compound
Chemical nature
Mechanism of action
Ref.
Elisidepsin Cyclic peptide With combination of cisplatin or paclitaxel showed synergistic toxicity on BC cells by reducing the phosphorylation of Akt and inhibiting the MAPK pathway via targeting ErbB expression Moghtaderi et al[74]
Sipholenol A Triterpene Increased the sensitivity of paclitaxel in BC cells by inhibiting P-gp and MRP1 Resmi et al[104] and Mohamed et al[105]
Permethyl ningalin B Pyrrole-containingcompound Sensitized BC cells to paclitaxel by inhibiting drug efflux activity of P-gp and increasing drug accumulation Resmi et al[104] and Mohamed et al[105]
Trabectedin Alkaloid Combination with cisplatin or paclitaxel or doxorubicin showed an additive effect in the preclinical system Chen et al[75]
Marine polysaccharide Polysaccharide In combination with cisplatin, synergistically inhibited the proliferation and migration by blocking the MMP-2 and MMP-9 expression Chen et al[75]
Iturin A Cyclo-lipopeptide In combination with docetaxel, substantially sensitized docetaxel-resistant TNBC cells by reducing proliferation via massive arresting at the G1 stage and activating caspase 3 as well as inhibiting Akt and its downstream signaling pathways Dey et al[119]
Renieramycin M Tetrahydro-isoquinoline Sensitized MCF-7 cells synergistically to doxorubicin by promoting doxorubicin-induced DNA damage, cell cycle arrest, and apoptosis via downregulating ErbB/PI3K-Akt, integrin, and focal adhesion signaling Tun et al[120]
Sulfated polysaccharide - In combination with pH-sensitive DOX releasing nanosystem inhibited growth and metastasis of BC cells in tumor-bearing mice Zhang et al[121]
Papuamine Pentacyclic alkaloid Inhibited colony formation of BC cells by targeting activation of JNK Kanno et al[122]

BC: Breast cancer; MAPK: Mitogen-activated protein kinase; P-gp: P-glycoprotein; MRP: Multidrug-resistant associated protein; MMP: Matrix metalloproteinase; TNBC: Triple-negative breast cancer; DOX: Doxorubicin; JNK: c-Jun N-terminal kinase.