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BMC Cancer logoLink to BMC Cancer
. 2022 May 7;22:512. doi: 10.1186/s12885-022-09580-7

Pharmacogenomics of in vitro response of the NCI-60 cancer cell line panel to Indian natural products

Hari Sankaran 1,, Simarjeet Negi 1, Lisa M McShane 1, Yingdong Zhao 1, Julia Krushkal 1,
PMCID: PMC9077913  PMID: 35525914

Abstract

Background

Indian natural products have been anecdotally used for cancer treatment but with limited efficacy. To better understand their mechanism, we examined the publicly available data for the activity of Indian natural products in the NCI-60 cell line panel.

Methods

We examined associations of molecular genomic features in the well-characterized NCI-60 cancer cell line panel with in vitro response to treatment with 75 compounds derived from Indian plant-based natural products. We analyzed expression measures for annotated transcripts, lncRNAs, and miRNAs, and protein-changing single nucleotide variants in cancer-related genes. We also examined the similarities between cancer cell line response to Indian natural products and response to reference anti-tumor compounds recorded in a U.S. National Cancer Institute (NCI) Developmental Therapeutics Program database.

Results

Hierarchical clustering based on cell line response measures identified clustering of Phyllanthus and cucurbitacin products with known anti-tumor agents with anti-mitotic mechanisms of action. Curcumin and curcuminoids mostly clustered together. We found associations of response to Indian natural products with expression of multiple genes, notably including SLC7A11 involved in solute transport and ATAD3A and ATAD3B encoding mitochondrial ATPase proteins, as well as significant associations with functional single nucleotide variants, including BRAF V600E.

Conclusion

These findings suggest potential mechanisms of action and novel associations of in vitro response with gene expression and some cancer-related mutations that increase our understanding of these Indian natural products.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12885-022-09580-7.

Keywords: Ayurveda, Natural products, Drug response, Cancer cell lines, NCI-60, Gene expression, Single nucleotide variation

Background

History of Ayurveda

Ayurveda is a traditional system of medicine that originated around 3000–4000 BCE, which utilizes Indian natural products (INP) derived mainly from plants to treat “imbalances” in the body aiming to cure a variety of diseases, including cancer [1]. In the Ayurvedic system of herbal medicine, there are 3 main physiologic states called doshas which are based on several phenotypic (body frame, weight, facial features) and mental (memory, emotional lability) factors. A fundamental belief in Ayurvedic medicine is that an imbalance in these doshas leads to disease and illness, which are purported to be corrected by a combination of these herbal remedies [2].

Historical references in Ayurvedic text contain some of the first descriptions of cancer (blood and soft tissue) and their successful treatment with a combination of INPs administered via oral and topical routes [2]. However, results reported in these historical references are difficult to replicate due to the use of multiple herbal products in combination, a difference in basic disease terminology, and heterogeneity in preparation of the herbal compounds [3, 4]. Despite the uncertain efficacy of these INPs, Ayurvedic medications have been reported to be used by as many as 20–40% of patients with cancer in India as they are believed to prevent chemotherapy-related toxicity, boost immunity, and slow tumor growth [5, 6]. Knowledge of the putative anticancer mechanisms of action of individual molecular compounds comprising the INPs is incomplete, however some in vitro and in vivo data for several commonly used INPs exist and are discussed below.

Examples of Indian natural products

Curcumin is a bioactive polyphenol that is the most common curcuminoid, a group of compounds that impart a yellow color to Curcuma longa (turmeric). Curcumin has generated a lot of interest as an INP with possible chemo-preventative, anticancer, and anti-inflammatory properties, highlighting the difficulty of defining a specific indication due to its description as a panacea [7]. Some reports have demonstrated the modest activity of curcumin to induce apoptosis in cancer cell lines, its role in enhancing response to cisplatin, and its anti-inflammatory properties [7, 8]. These findings have led to many trials including active clinical trials in the US (NCT02064673, NCT02944578, NCT02782949) exploring the role of curcumin as a chemo-preventative agent in preventing gastric cancer, cervical intraepithelial neoplasia, and the recurrence of prostate cancer.

Neem (Azadirachta indica) is another commonly used herbal product that has several component INPs with reported anticancer properties, which highlights the difficulty in isolating active INP compounds. Nimbolide is a terpenoid lactone derived from Neem that induces apoptosis in pancreatic cancer cells through reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation and upregulation of pro-apoptotic proteins [9]. Gedunine, a pentacyclic triterpenoid derived from Neem, has also demonstrated activity in pancreatic cancer through inhibition of the sonic hedgehog pathway [10]. These mechanisms of action of multiple INPs from the same herbal product make it difficult to attribute the activity of INPs, which is further complicated as many patients taking INPs receive combinations of several herbal products.

Amla (Phyllanthus emblica), a.k.a. Indian gooseberry, is part of the genus Phyllanthus, which has been used in traditional herbal medicine to treat multiple ailments. The Phyllanthus genus includes several species (e.g., P. niruri, P. urinaria, P. fraternus, etc.) which have been used to treat a wide range of ailments from diabetes to renal calculi [11]. Although anecdotal reports of use of Amla to treat cancer are lacking, some active molecules in Amla have been studied more extensively, including quercetin. Quercetin, a polyphenolic flavonoid derived from P. emblica, has been shown to attenuate tumor growth in breast and pancreatic cancer models through multiple mechanisms including growth signal inhibition of the PI3K pathway and tyrosine kinase inhibition [12].

Cucurbitacins are a group of compounds characterized by a tripterpene hydrocarbon. which are found in over 40 species, including Indian plants such as Brahmi (Bacopa monnieri) and bitter gourd (Momordica charantia) [13]. These plants, which are known for their bitter taste due to the cucurbitacins, are purported to prevent cancer and are administered orally as a liquid formulation. While cucurbitacin B is one of the more extensively studied cucurbitacins, its putative anticancer mechanism of action is not well defined; however this product is thought to be involved in JAK/STAT pathway inhibition and F-actin cytoskeleton disruption [14].

While putative anti-cancer mechanisms of action have been suggested for commonly used INPs as detailed above, these data are often limited to in vitro response in one or a few cell lines. Data regarding rarer INPs including plumbagin (Plumbago zeylanica), alizarin (Rubia cordifolia), and Achilleol A (Achillea odorata) are limited or have not yet been reported [15]. Analysis of data from a large database of cell line assay results such as the NCI-60 cancer cell line panel data, for the purpose of determining a mechanism of action, may improve our understanding of these INPs.

NCI-60 cell line panel

Our overall strategy to explore the possible mechanisms of action of INPs was to compare patterns of cell line response to each INP with publicly available data to those for standard reference anticancer compounds and to identify clusters (subtrees) of INPs with similar patterns of response across the NCI-60 cell lines. Next, we examined the association of gene expression levels and of clinically or biologically important single nucleotide variants (SNVs) with response to individual INPs. We also examined how the molecular features associated with tumor cell line responses to individual INPs were distributed among the INP subtrees that had similar patterns of response. Lastly, we investigated the biological pathways representing the gene expression patterns that were associated with different INP subtrees. These analyses provided new insights into potential mechanisms of actions of the INPs.

To examine the activity of INPs in tumor cells, we analyzed publicly available data from the NCI-60 cancer cell line panel. The NCI-60 initiative was started by the U.S. National Cancer Institute (NCI) in 1989 with the purpose of screening candidate anti-cancer compounds on 60 cancer cell lines representing 10 different tumor types. Over 100,000 compounds have been screened to date, including INPs and well-characterized reference compounds approved for clinical use (e.g., paclitaxel, methotrexate, and other agents) [1618]. The Developmental Therapeutics Program (DTP) of the NCI screens these compounds using a single high-dose test to meet pre-specified minimum inhibition criteria and subsequently screens each compound in a 5-dose screen using a 48 h endpoint measured by a Sulforhodamine B stain [18]. Data recorded by the screen include GI50, IC50, LC50, and total growth inhibition (TGI) cell response data which are used to generate unique patterns across cell lines [1719]. To interrogate this rich dataset, the COMPARE algorithm was developed to allow comparisons of response patterns (across cell lines) of synthetic and natural products of interest with standard reference compounds to help determine their putative mechanisms of actions [16].

Additionally, molecular features of the NCI-60 cell lines have been extensively characterized. Their gene expression, whole exome sequencing, and other molecular data have been made publicly available [20, 21]. These data were integrated into online databases and made available through CellMiner and CellMinerCDB data portals, which allow access to gene expression, genetic variation, and drug sensitivity data [22, 23]. Measures of response of the cell lines to a large number of drugs and investigational compounds, including some natural products, are also publicly available from the NCI DTP NCI-60 Growth Inhibition data repository. Combined, these data provide an opportunity to assess gene-drug relationships. Thus, the NCI-60 resource offers a robust dataset that may be interrogated to increase our understanding of INPs and their mechanisms of action.

Methods

Figure 1 summarizes the workflow of the steps of the analyses in this study.

Fig. 1.

Fig. 1

The workflow of the steps in the analysis of the response of NCI-60 cancer cell lines to the Indian Natural Products and of the association of that response with molecular features of the NCI-60 cell lines. Details of each analysis are provided in the Methods section. INP Indian Natural Products, GSEA Gene set enrichment analysis, NCBI National Center for Biotechnology Information, TGI Total Growth Inhibition

Collection of Indian natural products and reference compounds with cell line response data

A biomedical literature search in PubMed at the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) using keywords “Ayurveda” AND “cancer” AND “review” was conducted to identify Ayurvedic herbs of interest, with a total of 170 publications found. Each publication was manually reviewed. Among them, 25 publications contained a comprehensive description of one or more Ayurvedic herbs and their specific INPs that are commonly used by Ayurvedic practitioners in cancer treatment. These INPs were included in subsequent searches. All INPs identified in our manual curation were then searched in PubMed for evidence of any activity in cancer cell lines and were compiled, resulting in the total of 258 INPs.

The NCI DTP screening program uses a special identifier, called an NSC number, for each compound screened in the NCI-60 cell line panel. Those INPs obtained from our literature search that did not have NSC numbers (n = 66) were excluded from further analysis. The unique NSC numbers for the remaining INPs (n = 192) identified from biomedical literature were interrogated using the NCI PUBLIC COMPARE portal for available GI50 data (https://dtp.cancer.gov/public_compare) [24, 25]. Each GI50 value represents sensitivity of an NCI-60 cell line to a particular compound, calculated as the concentration producing 50% growth inhibition that is derived from the 5-concentration screen of each compound at 48 h after incubation [18]. Those INPs with only single dose response data (n = 117) were excluded. The remaining INPs (n = 75) were used as input for separate queries in the NCI PUBLIC COMPARE portal. The public version of the NCI PUBLIC COMPARE database does not store the taxonomy and global locations of the original source products for the database compounds. The queries use Pearson correlation analysis to compare the vector of GI50 values across the NCI-60 cell line panel for each input INP to the vector of GI50 values for available COMPARE reference antitumor agents (including approved agents, e.g., methotrexate and vincristine, and experimental agents). We used a cutoff of the absolute value for a pairwise Pearson correlation coefficient |r|> 0.5 to select the reference compounds with similar GI50 response profiles to each input INP.

The NSC numbers of the 75 INPs and the 57 reference compounds that were correlated with at least one of those 75 INPs with |r|> 0.5 (Table 1) were used to download publicly available -log10 GI50 data (negative log10 GI50, referred as NLOGGI50 in the downloadable dataset) from the static public release at the DTP website NCI-60 Growth Inhibition data repository (https://wiki.nci.nih.gov/display/NCIDTPdata/NCI-60+Growth+Inhibition+Data). This dataset is currently available under previous releases (filename: NCI60_GI50_2016b.zip, June 2016 release downloaded on March 4, 2020). Details of the sample handling, preparation and cell line testing methods followed to generate the data in this repository are described elsewhere [19]. The NLOGGI50 values were multiplied by -1 in order to convert them to log10GI50, a measure of cell line response to treatment. Here and below, we refer to these measures as logGI50. All logGI50 values that were not available were set to missing. The term “compound” is used to describe the INPs and reference compounds with available logGI50 data. As multiple experiments had been run for each compound, the median logGI50 was calculated, using replicate experiments, for each cell line-compound pair. These median logGI50 values for each NCI-60 cell line were computed for all 132 compounds using 15,199 experiment records. The majority of the data were screened in molar units, except for the product of Ricinus communis (NSC 15384), which had the units in μg/ml and was not included in the clustering analysis for that reason. A more detailed description of the public COMPARE algorithm and the NCI-60 cell line panel can be found elsewhere [16].

Table 1.

Indian Natural Products and reference compounds with the absolute value of the pairwise Pearson correlation coefficient |r| between their logGI50 values > 0.5

NSC Compound Name Type (Ayurveda/Reference) Plant Name/Reference Product Mechanism logGI50 Dendrogram Subtree Same subtree based on logLC50 vs logGI50 Same subtree based on TGI vs logGI50
15384 Ricinus communis Ayurveda Ricinus communis (Castor) Not included in clustering Not included in clustering Not included in clustering
740 Methotrexate Reference antimetabolite Subtree 1 No No
58514 Chromomycin A3 Reference antitumor antibiotics Subtree 1 Yes Yes
332596 Rhizoxin Reference antitumor antibiotics Subtree 1 No Yes
332598 Rhizoxin Reference antitumor antibiotics Subtree 1 Yes Yes
143925 Pekilocerin A Ayurveda Calotropis (Madar) Subtree 1 Yes Yes
144153 Datiscoside Ayurveda Cordia dichotoma (Indian Cherry) Subtree 1 No No
49451 Curcubitacin B Ayurveda Cucurbitae family Subtree 1 No Yes
94743 Cucurbitacin A Ayurveda Cucurbitae family Subtree 1 Yes No
106399 Cucurbitacin E Ayurveda Cucurbitae family Subtree 1 Yes Yes
112167 Elatericin B Ayurveda Cucurbitae family Subtree 1 Yes Yes
308606 Cucurbitacin D Ayurveda Cucurbitae family Subtree 1 No No
521777 Elatericin B Ayurveda Cucurbitae family Subtree 1 No No
352122 Trimetrexate Reference antimetabolite Subtree 1 No No
139105 Soluble Baker's Antifol Reference antimetabolite Subtree 1 No No
123127 Doxorubicin (Adriamycin) Reference antitumor antibiotic Subtree 1 No No
337766 Bisantrene hydrochloride Reference antitumor antibiotic Subtree 1 Yes Yes
49842 Vinblastine sulfate Reference mitotic inhibitor Subtree 1 Yes Yes
67574 Vincristine sulfate Reference mitotic inhibitor Subtree 1 No No
90636 Vinleurosine Sulfate Reference mitotic inhibitor Subtree 1 No No
125973 Paclitaxel (Taxol) Reference mitotic inhibitor Subtree 1 No No
153858 Maytansine Reference mitotic inhibitor Subtree 1 No Yes
141537 Anguidine Reference not defined Subtree 1 Yes Yes
165563 Bruceantin Reference antitumor antibiotic Subtree 1 Yes Yes
325319 Didemnin B Reference Protein synthesis inhibitor Subtree 1 Yes Yes
328426 Phyllanthoside Ayurveda Phyllanthus genus Subtree 1 Yes Yes
342443 S3'-desacetyl-Phyllanthoside Ayurveda Phyllanthus genus Subtree 1 No Yes
3053 Actinomycin D Reference antitumor antibiotic Subtree 1 Yes Yes
19912 Cryptopleurine Ayurveda Tylophora Alkaloids Subtree 1 Yes Yes
76387 Tylophorin Ayurveda Tylophora Indica Subtree 1 No Yes
717335 Tylophorin Ayurveda Tylophora Indica Subtree 1 No Yes
375575 Cyclopentenylcytosine Reference antimetabolite Subtree 1 No No
156236 Achillin Ayurveda Achillea odorata (Yarrow) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
710351 Achilleol A Ayurveda Achillea odorata (Yarrow) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
26428 Esculetin Ayurveda Aesculus Hippocastanum (Horse Chestnut) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
750 Busulfan Reference alkylator Subtree 2 Yes Yes
344007 Piperazine alkylator Reference alkylator Subtree 2 Yes Yes
353451 Mitozolamide Reference alkylator Subtree 2 Yes Yes
409962 BCNU Reference alkylator Subtree 2 Yes Yes
227189 Aloin Ayurveda Aloe (Kumariasava) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
5605 Benzalacetone Ayurveda Alpinia Galanga (Asian Ginger) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
139490 Emofolin sodium Reference antimetabolite Subtree 2 No No
224131 PALA Reference antimetabolite Subtree 2 No No
731917 Calendulaglycoside B Ayurveda Calendula officinalis (pot marigold) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
62794 Beta carotene Ayurveda Daucas carota (Carrot) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
2819 Cianidol Ayurveda Catechin (Bergenia ciliate) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643032 M-Phenoxy-alpha-phenylcinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643033 P-Acetoxy-alpha-diethylphosphono-cinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643160 3-Bromo-4-dimethylamino-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrite Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643167 3,4-Methylenedioxy-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643181 3,4,5-Trimethoxy-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643183 3-Methoxy-4-hydroxy-alpha-benzoylcinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643185 3,5-Dimethoxy-alpha-phenylcinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643190 3-Methoxy-4-benzyloxy-alpha-benzoylcinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643764 O-Methoxy-alpha-benzoylcinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
643772 O-Fluoro-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
184734 Cucurbitacin I Ayurveda Cucurbitae family Subtree 2 Yes Yes
682343 Curcumenol Ayurveda Curcuma zedoaria (White turmeric) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
327430 Resveratrol Ayurveda Darakchasava (Vitis vinifera) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
285115 DQ1 Ayurveda Datura Subtree 2 Yes Yes
90487 Lupeol Ayurveda Hemidesmus indicus (Indian Sarsaparilla) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
57197 Caffeic Acid Ayurveda Honey, coffee Subtree 2 Yes Yes
32065 Hydroxyurea Reference ribonucleotide reductase inhibitor Subtree 2 No No
51143 IMPY Reference ribonucleotide reductase inhibitor Subtree 2 No No
253272 Caracemide Reference ribonucleotide reductase inhibitor Subtree 2 Yes Yes
291643 Pyrimidine-5-glycodialdehyde Reference ribonucleotide reductase inhibitor Subtree 2 Yes Yes
118994 Diglycoaldehyde Reference antimetabolite Subtree 2 No No
126849 3-deazauridine Reference antimetabolite Subtree 2 No No
218321 2'-deoxycoformycin Reference antimetabolite Subtree 2 Yes Yes
37364 O6-methylguanine Reference antimetabolite Subtree 2 Yes Yes
322921 Pibenzimol hydrochloride Reference topoisomerase inihibitor Subtree 2 Yes Yes
73754 Fluorodopan Reference alkylator Subtree 2 Yes Yes
303861 L-cysteine analogue Reference inhibitory amino acid analog Subtree 2 Yes Yes
844 Nesol Ayurveda Limonene (Citrus) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
368675 Azadirachtin Ayurveda Azadiractha indica (Neem) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
150014 Hydrazine sulfate Reference not defined Subtree 2 No No
293015 Flavone acetic acid ester Reference not defined Subtree 2 Yes Yes
343513 Dihydrolenperone Reference not defined Subtree 2 Yes Yes
407300 Crocetin Ayurveda Saffron Subtree 2 Yes Yes
178886 Paeony root Ayurveda Paeonia officinalis (Peony) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
619043 Phyllanthin Ayurveda Phyllanthus genus Subtree 2 Yes Yes
619044 Hypophyllanthin Ayurveda Phyllanthus genus Subtree 2 Yes Yes
9219 Quertine Ayurveda Phyllanthus genus Subtree 2 Yes Yes
7212 Alizarin Ayurveda Rubia cordifolia (Red madder) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
8096 Harzol Ayurveda Saraca asoca (Ashoka) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
284356 Mitindomide Reference topoisomerase inihibitor Subtree 2 Yes Yes
22842 Cumostrol Ayurveda Trifolium pratense (Red clover) Subtree 2 Yes Yes
407290 Myricitin Reference not defined Subtree 2 Yes Yes
79037 CCNU Reference alkylator Subtree 3 No No
95441 Methyl-CCNU Reference alkylator Subtree 3 No No
167780 Asaley Reference alkylator Subtree 3 No Yes
330500 Macbecin II Reference antitumor antibiotics Subtree 3 Yes Yes
113497 Gedunine Ayurveda Azadirachta indica (Neem) Subtree 3 No No
309909 Nimbolide Ayurveda Azadirachta indica (Neem) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
87868 Phenethyl mustard oil Ayurveda Brasicaceae and Fabaceae (Watercress) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
708791 Bulbophyllanthrone Ayurveda Bulbophyllum odaratissimum (Orchid) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
652892 Butein Ayurveda Butea monosperma (Palash) Subtree 3 No No
731920 Calendulaglycoside B-6'-O-butyl ester Ayurveda Calendula officinalis (Pot marigold) Subtree 3 No No
731921 Calendulaglycoside D2 Ayurveda Calendula officinalis (Pot marigold) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
731922 Calendulaglycoside D-6'-O-methyl ester Ayurveda Calendula officinalis (Pot marigold) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
26727 Cycvalon Ayurveda Curcuma genus (Turmeric) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
643023 Alpha-Phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 3 No No
643769 O-Bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile Ayurveda Cinnamonum (Cinnamon) Subtree 3 No No
112166 Cucurbitacin K Ayurveda Cucurbitae family Subtree 3 No Yes
742019 Ethoxycurcumin tribenzimidazolmethylcarbonte Ayurveda Curcuma genus (Turmeric) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
742020 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte Ayurveda Curcuma genus (Turmeric) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
742021 Curcumin tri adamantylaminoethylcarbonate Ayurveda Curcuma genus (Turmeric) Subtree 3 No No
742022 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate Ayurveda Curcuma genus (Turmeric) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
752571 Curcumin-difluorinated (CDF) Ayurveda Curcuma genus (Turmeric) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
705537 Daturaolone Ayurveda Datura metel (Datura) Subtree 3 No No
119875 Cisplatin Reference alkylator Subtree 3 No Yes
271674 Carboxyphthalatoplatinum Reference alkylator Subtree 3 No No
102816 5-azacytidine Reference DNA methyltransferase inhibitor Subtree 3 No Yes
91874 Emberine Ayurveda Embelia Ribes (False black pepper) Subtree 3 No Yes
180973 Tamoxifen Reference Estrogen receptor binder Subtree 3 Yes Yes
365798 Piceatannol Ayurveda Vitis vinifera (Grapes) Subtree 3 No No
674038 Gallocatechin Ayurveda Punica granatum (Pomegranate) Subtree 3 No No
383468 Andrographolide Ayurveda Andrographis Paniculata (Green chiretta) Subtree 3 No No
303812 Aphidicolin glycinate Reference DNA polymerase inhibitor Subtree 3 No No
133100 Rifamycin SV Reference inhibit DNA-dependent RNA polymerase Subtree 3 No No
83265 S-trityl-L-cysteine Reference mitotic inhibitor Subtree 3 No No
236613 Plumbagin Ayurveda Plumbago zeylanica (Chitrak) Subtree 3 Yes Yes
104801 Cytembena Reference antimetabolite Subtree 3 No No
163501 AT-125 (acivicin) Reference antimetabolite Subtree 3 No No
19893 5-fluorouracil Reference antimetabolite Subtree 3 No No
126771 Dichloroallyl lawsone Reference antimetabolite Subtree 3 No No
368390 DUP785 (brequinar) Reference antimetabolite Subtree 3 No No
77037 D-tetrandrine Reference not defined Subtree 3 Yes Yes
7616 Aconitic acid Ayurveda Saccharum officinarum (sugarcane) Subtree 3 No No
32982 Curcumin Ayurveda Curcuma genus (Turmeric) Subtree 3 No No
237020 Largomycin Reference not defined Subtree 4 Yes Yes
326231 L-Buthionine sulfoximine Reference not defined Subtree 4 No No

The column labeled Plant Name/Reference Product Mechanism shows the main mechanism of action of reference products and taxonomy for Ayurvedic compounds. More than one plant may contain the compound of interest

Cmpd: compound

logGI50 Dendrogram Subtree: shows subtree assignment of an INP or reference compound based on the clustering of logGI50 values

Same subtree based on logLC50 vs logGI50: indicates whether an INP or a reference compound showed a similar clustering with other INPs and compounds based on logLC50 values and was assigned to the subtree with the same number as compared to the subtree assignment based on logGI50 values

Same subtree based on TGI vs logGI50: indicates whether an INP or a reference compound showed a similar clustering with other INPs and compounds based on the total growth inhibition (TGI) values and was assigned to the subtree with the same number as compared to the subtree assignment based on logGI50 values

The product of the Ricinus communis (NSC 15384) was not included in the clustering analysis as its concentration units were different from those for other INPs

Clustering based on logGI50 is presented graphically in Fig. 2 and Supplementary Fig. 1. Clustering based on logLC50 and TGI is presented in Supplementary Figs. 2 and 3, respectively. Detailed comparison of differences among clustering based on different response measures is provided in Supplementary Table 5

Hierarchical clustering of the logGI50, logLC50 and TGI values of INPs and reference compounds

In order to identify groups of INPs with similar patterns of activity in the NCI-60 cell line panel, we employed hierarchical clustering of the INPs. The initial clustering to identify groups of compounds with similar response patterns was based on the logGI50 values (Fig. 2). Reference compounds were also included in the clustering to provide information about possible mechanisms of action of each hierarchical cluster, or subtree, containing INPs with similar response. Clustering was based on pairwise Euclidean distances between each compound pair, which were calculated using the logGI50 values of the INPs and reference compounds in all 60 NCI-60 cell lines. A hierarchical tree based on these Euclidean distances was generated using the hclust package using the ‘average’, or UPGMA, option and exported for further visualization using the ape package [26]. Additionally, a 2-dimensional heatmap of the compounds and cell lines was generated from logGI50 values using heatmap.2 in the gplots package. We used RStudio v1.2.5033 for clustering analysis. Further visualization and graphical representation of the hierarchical clustering of all compounds and of their individual subtrees was done using Dendroscope version 3.7.2 [27].

Fig. 2.

Fig. 2

Hierarchical clustering of INPs and reference compounds based on their median logGI50 values across NCI60 cell lines. The tree was inferred using the UPGMA (‘average’) method and was based on Euclidean distances. The tree is presented as an unrooted radial phylogram. The scale in the top left corner is provided for the branch length, which were derived from Euclidean distances. Clustered products are displayed with sparse labeling, in which only a random subset of INP labels is displayed. Detailed information about the INPs in each subtree is provided in Table 1 and Supplementary Table 4

To augment the analysis of clusters of INPs and reference compounds using logGI50 values, we also performed separate clustering of compounds using logLC50 and TGI values representing the 50% lethal concentration needed for the 50% cell kill and the concentration (also on the log10 scale) for the total inhibition of growth, respectively[18, 19, 25]. Both logLC50 and TGI values were downloaded from the December 2021 release of the NCI-60 Growth Inhibition Data (https://wiki.nci.nih.gov/NCIDTPdata/NCI-60+Growth+Inhibition+Data). Values for all INPs and reference compounds were extracted, and median values were computed as detailed above. Pairwise Euclidean distances were calculated, and unrooted radial hierarchical trees were generated using the methodology described above. These trees were visualized and compared to the tree inferred using logGI50 values (Fig. 2; Table 1). Subsequent analyses of association of INP response with gene expression, gene enrichment, and single nucleotide variation data were performed using logGI50 values as the primary endpoint measure.

Analysis of association of gene expression with INP activity

To examine how NCI-60 cell line response to INPs may be influenced by molecular genetic features, we analyzed the association of median logGI50 values with NCI-60 molecular data. Pre-treatment gene expression data for the NCI-60 cell lines was downloaded from the CellMinerCDB resource [23, 28]. A more detailed description of the collection of molecular measures can be found in our previous publication [29]. For expression analysis, we used log2 transformed expression measures of 23,059 annotated transcripts, lncRNAs, and miRNAs which had been previously combined from five Affymetrix expression microarray platforms and normalized by the CellMiner development team [22]. Cell lines for which there were no drug response data (MDA-MB-468) or no gene expression data (MDA-N) were excluded (n = 2). For each gene-INP pair, Spearman correlation was computed to evaluate the association between pre-treatment gene expression and logGI50 in 58 cell lines. Benjamini–Hochberg procedure was applied to control the false discovery rate (FDR) across the 23,059 gene × 75 INP pairs. Gene-INP pairs with FDR-adjusted p < 0.05 were considered significant. A positive value of the Spearman correlation coefficient ρ indicated an association of higher gene expression with higher logGI50 values of an INP, i.e., with increased resistance to that INP. Similarly, negative values of ρ showed an association of higher gene expression with lower logGI50 values, i.e., with increased sensitivity to that INP. Here and below, the terms sensitivity and resistance were used to define the direction of the associations, as the analyses of logGI50 values were performed on the continuous scale. All genes with significant Spearman correlations were investigated to determine whether the gene involved in the gene-INP pair was associated with a known molecular mechanism of action of reference compounds that clustered in the same subtree with that INP.

Gene set enrichment analysis

Gene set enrichment analysis was performed using g:Profiler (https://biit.cs.ut.ee/gprofiler/gost), which is a regularly updated web-based utility that includes annotated pathway gene sets from KEGG, Reactome, and WikiPathways [30]. Genes that were significantly associated with response to INPs (FDR adjusted p < 0.1) in each cluster were stratified to negatively and positively correlated groups (Supplementary Tables 13). GSEA analysis was performed on each gene group separately for each cluster, using the gene symbols as input for g:Profiler. A significance level for enriched pathways was set at p < 0.05 (FDR adjusted).

Analysis of association of INP activity with single nucleotide variants

To examine the association between NCI-60 cell line response to INPs and specific DNA alterations of cancer genes that may affect cytotoxicity response, whole exome sequencing (WES) data were downloaded from the CellMiner data download portal [22, 31]. One cell line (MDA-N) which did not have drug response data was excluded, leaving a total of 59 cell lines available for analysis.

The data were filtered using a list of candidate genes and functionally relevant SNVs from OncoKB v. 1.17, a curated precision oncology knowledge base [32]. As outlined in our earlier report [29], the list consisted of variants classified by OncoKB at levels 1–4 of potential therapeutic action, R1 and R2 levels of resistance, and variants classified as “oncogenic” and “likely oncogenic”. After applying this filter to the CellMiner WES data, 1,586 protein changing SNVs in 280 genes across 59 NCI-60 cell lines were identified. These SNVs, which included nonsynonymous changes, frameshift variants, and variants involving the stop codon or the loss of a translational initiation codon start site, were additionally filtered to include only variants present in at least 3 NCI-60 cell lines, resulting in 107 genes with 220 SNVs across 59 cell lines. A Student’s t-test was used to compare logGI50 values between groups of NCI-60 cell lines defined by variant status, for each SNV-INP pair. A positive value of the t-statistic indicated an association of higher gene expression with higher logGI50 values of an INP, i.e. increased resistance to that INP, whereas a negative value of the t-statistic showed an association of higher gene expression with lower logGI50 values, i.e. increased sensitivity to that INP. All analyses of associations between response to the natural products and sequence variants were performed using the RStudio v1.0.153. Biological interpretation of significant SNV-response associations was based on SNV annotation in OncoKB, using its updated annotation of levels of functional and oncogenic SNV effects as of 03/25/2021, and on published reports in biomedical literature.

Visualization of associations of response to INPs with molecular features and with cellular pathways in the NCI-60 cell lines

Visualization of significant associations (FDR adjusted p < 0.05) of logGI50 with gene expression and with single nucleotide variants, and of association of significantly upregulated and downregulated cellular pathways with INP subtrees was performed using Cytoscape v. 3.9.1 [33] and Microsoft Excel.

Results

Hierarchical clustering of Indian natural products and reference compounds based on the logGI50 measures

Figure 2 shows the hierarchical clustering of the Indian natural products and reference compounds based on their median logGI50 values, presenting the results as an unrooted radial phylogram. Clustering revealed 4 distinct subtrees. As Subtree 4 consisted of only reference products (NSC 326231 - L-buthionine sulfoximine, and NSC 237020 - largomycin), it was excluded from subsequent analysis. Supplementary Fig. 1 provides a heatmap showing the two-dimensional clustering of the NCI-60 cell lines and the INPs and reference compounds, clustered according to the similar patterns of cell line response to these compounds using logGI50 values. The similarities of logGI50 response patterns within each subtree may suggest similar potency of the INPs with their grouped reference products and possibly similar mechanisms of actions.

Subtree 1 (13 INPs and 18 reference products)

The reference compounds in this subtree have mainly anti-mitotic activity (vincristine sulfate, vinleurosine sulfate, vinblastine sulfate, paclitaxel); however, they also included some agents that act as DNA intercalators (doxorubicin) and anti-metabolites (methotrexate). Some INPs of the cucurbitacin family and its derivatives (Cucurbitacin A, B, D, E, L, datiscoside) affect mitotic spindles and delay mitoses leading to a G2/M phase cell cycle arrest of cancer cells [13, 14]. Phyllanthoside has been demonstrated to function both in vivo and in vitro as an inhibitor of eukaryotic protein synthesis by interfering with translation elongation, similar to the reference compound actinomycin D[34]. While a mechanism of action has not been clearly defined for tylophorin and its analog cryptoleurine, some experimental evidence points toward G1 arrest through cyclin A2 downregulation and VEGF2-mediated angiogenesis, which is not a known mechanism of any of the reference compounds correlated with its cytotoxicity [35, 36].

Subtree 2 (34 INPs and 22 reference products)

The 22 reference compounds in this subtree had many different mechanisms of action; however, the majority fit into either alkylators (piperazine, mitrozolamide, BCNU, busulfan), ribonucleoide reductase inhibitors (pyrimidine-5-glycodialdehyde, caracemide, IMPY, hydroxyurea), and broad inhibitors of RNA synthesis (diglycoaldehyde, 3-deazauridine). The 34 INPs included in this cluster consisted of a large group of cinnamon-based INPs and some Phyllanthus INPs.

Subtree 3 (25 INPs and 17 reference products)

The 17 reference compounds in this subtree consisted of a variety of alkylators (CCNU, methyl-CCNU, asaley), anti-metabolites (AT-125, 5-FU, DUP785, dichloroallyl lawsone), and DNA-crosslinking agents (carboxy-platinum). The 25 INPs included in Subtree 3 consisted of curcumin, curcuminoids, neem, and Calendula products.

Hierarchical clustering of Indian natural products and reference compounds based on the logLC50 and TGI measures

Supplementary Figs. 2 and 3 show the hierarchical clustering of INPs and reference compounds based on their median logLC50 or TGI values, respectively. The trees inferred using logLC50 and TGI were similar to each other, except for 12 compounds. Both logLC50 and TGI trees were comprised of 5 distinct subtrees, as compared to 4 distinct subtrees in the logGI50 tree (Fig. 2, Supplementary Figs. 23). Table 1 provides information, for each INP and reference compound, whether a compound had a similar clustering with other compounds and was assigned to a subtree with the same number based on logLC50 and TGI as compared to the subtrees based on clustering of logGI50. Detailed comparison of the cluster assignment of the compounds based on different response measures is provided in Supplementary Table 5. Clustering which was based on TGI was more similar to logGI50-based clustering, whereas with the logLC50-based clustering more compounds showed differences from their logGI50-based cluster assignment (Supplementary Table 5). These patterns of similarity and difference between the three trees derived from different response measures may be explained by the fact that logGI50 and TGI both represent different degrees of growth inhibition, both being derived from the growth curve, whereas logLC50 is a different parameter representing a concentration needed to achieve 50% of cell kill [19]. Overall, the clustering was consistent for many INPs among the three difference response measures (Table 1 and Supplementary Table 5). It was less consistent for a number of reference compounds, possibly due to the higher potency of established anticancer drugs, which may result in their lower concentration needed to achieve total growth inhibition (TGI) or 50% lethal concentration (LC) as compared to the INPs. Seven reference compounds from subtree 2 of the logGI50 tree formed a separate cluster (subtree 5) in both TGI- and logLC50-based trees. Anti-mitotic reference compounds (e.g. vinblastine, vincristine) clustered closely together in logGI50 subtree 1, however they were not tightly clustered in both logLC50 and TGI trees. The cluster assignment of many INPs (e.g. cinnamon and turmeric) in both logLC50 and TGI trees was similar to that in the logGI50 tree.

Association of cell line response to INPs with gene expression

Using pre-treatment gene expression data of 23,059 transcripts and the median logGI50 values of the 75 INPs, we conducted a Spearman correlation analysis that identified 204 natural product-gene pairs (including 190 unique genes and 28 unique INPs) that were statistically significant after adjusting for multiple testing (FDR adjusted p value < 0.05). All significant results are listed in Table 2 and summarized in a graphical format in Supplementary Fig. 4. Below we discuss some of the highly significant correlations of biologically important protein-coding genes.

Table 2.

Significant associations of gene expression and logGI50 of Indian Natural Products in the NCI-60 cell line panel

NSC Gene Spearman ρ Original p value FDR adjusted p value Dendrogram subtree Active molecule
328426 MYB -0.66 1.7e-08 0.004 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 BEND7 0.65 2.8e-08 0.005 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
308606 ZBTB33 -0.67 1.0e-07 0.012 Subtree 1 Cucurbitacin D
328426 NHS 0.62 2.0e-07 0.014 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 WWC1 0.61 3.0e-07 0.019 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
94743 TRMT112 0.65 4.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 1 Cucurbitacin A
328426 RBMS2 0.60 5.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
342443 EHD2 0.66 6.0e-07 0.025 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
328426 PROSER2 0.60 8.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 SMAP2 -0.60 8.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 BAGE -0.59 8.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 C6orf89 -0.59 9.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 EGFR 0.59 1.0e-06 0.027 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 PDLIM1 0.59 1.0e-06 0.027 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
94743 ZNF48 0.63 1.0e-06 0.027 Subtree 1 Cucurbitacin A
328426 CNPPD1 -0.59 1.1e-06 0.029 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
342443 CLMP 0.65 1.1e-06 0.029 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
143925 ATP1A1 0.59 1.2e-06 0.030 Subtree 1 Pekilocerin A
342443 ADAM9 0.64 1.4e-06 0.031 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
328426 MON1A -0.58 1.4e-06 0.031 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 ZNF319 0.58 1.6e-06 0.033 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 HKDC1 0.58 1.8e-06 0.036 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
342443 CD151 0.64 2.0e-06 0.037 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
328426 AJUBA 0.58 2.1e-06 0.038 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
112167 TLN1 -0.62 2.3e-06 0.040 Subtree 1 Elatericin B
328426 HESX1 -0.57 2.4e-06 0.040 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 MMP24 0.57 2.5e-06 0.042 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 TJP1 0.57 2.7e-06 0.043 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 TNFRSF12A 0.57 2.7e-06 0.043 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
342443 ZFP36L1 0.63 2.9e-06 0.043 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
342443 NNMT 0.63 3.0e-06 0.043 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
328426 BIN1 0.57 3.0e-06 0.043 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
342443 MTCL1 0.63 3.1e-06 0.043 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
342443 TNFRSF1A 0.62 3.8e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
342443 LOC101241902 0.62 3.8e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
328426 GOLGA6L5P 0.56 3.9e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
521777 SLAMF6 0.56 3.9e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Elatericin B
342443 UCKL1 -0.62 3.9e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
143925 ILF2P1 -0.56 4.0e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Pekilocerin A
328426 NUAK2 0.56 4.0e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 PUS3 -0.56 4.1e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 C2CD2L -0.56 4.3e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
342443 NRP1 0.62 4.3e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
328426 LRRN4 0.56 4.3e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 SLC35F3 0.56 4.4e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
328426 ZNF639 -0.56 4.6e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
143925 FNIP1 0.56 4.7e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Pekilocerin A
94743 ZNF629 0.60 4.8e-06 0.046 Subtree 1 Cucurbitacin A
328426 FRAT2 -0.56 5.6e-06 0.048 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
342443 NR2F2 0.61 5.8e-06 0.049 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
342443 ITGB1 0.61 5.9e-06 0.049 Subtree 1 S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside
328426 CLDN1 0.56 5.9e-06 0.049 Subtree 1 Phyllanthoside
844 ZNF823 0.65 5.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 2 Nesol
62794 FOXN4 -0.62 1.2e-06 0.030 Subtree 2 Beta carotene
327430 OGFOD2 -0.64 1.7e-06 0.035 Subtree 2 Resveratrol
90487 SDHC 0.57 3.6e-06 0.046 Subtree 2 Lupeol
643160 LCP1 -0.62 4.0e-06 0.046 Subtree 2 3-Bromo-4-dimethylamino-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrite
844 PBX4 0.60 4.2e-06 0.046 Subtree 2 Nesol
90487 PFKFB2 0.56 5.3e-06 0.048 Subtree 2 Lupeol
619043 KIR2DL2 -0.63 5.6e-06 0.049 Subtree 2 Phyllanthin
236613 SLC7A11 0.79 1.0e-13 0.000 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
32982 ATAD3B -0.67 1.3e-08 0.003 Subtree 3 Curcumin
309909 PDCD11 -0.66 2.3e-08 0.005 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
32982 HNRNPR -0.66 3.0e-08 0.005 Subtree 3 Curcumin
309909 RPL34P6 -0.64 1.0e-07 0.009 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
32982 RPL11 -0.64 1.0e-07 0.012 Subtree 3 Curcumin
32982 PNRC2 -0.64 1.0e-07 0.012 Subtree 3 Curcumin
236613 HDHD2 -0.63 1.0e-07 0.013 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
309909 RPL34 -0.63 1.0e-07 0.013 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
309909 HNRNPA1P55 -0.63 2.0e-07 0.014 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
87868 NOLC1 -0.68 2.0e-07 0.014 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 NPM3 -0.68 2.0e-07 0.014 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
236613 NR2F1 0.62 2.0e-07 0.014 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
742021 ERICH1 -0.62 2.0e-07 0.017 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri adamantylaminoethylcarbonate
87868 SRPK1 -0.67 3.0e-07 0.018 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
309909 RPS10P2 -0.62 3.0e-07 0.018 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
87868 RBMXP1 -0.67 3.0e-07 0.018 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
742020 RPL21P134 -0.61 3.0e-07 0.018 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte
705537 C5orf15 -0.63 4.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 3 Daturaolone
742022 CCDC149 0.61 4.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
742020 RPL13AP3 -0.61 5.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte
87868 ADAT2 -0.66 5.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 HIF1A 0.66 5.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
236613 SLC7A11-AS1 0.60 5.0e-07 0.022 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
32982 SPEN -0.60 7.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Curcumin
236613 ACTN4P1 0.60 7.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
643769 SMARCC1 -0.65 7.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 O-Bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile
643769 RPSAP56 -0.65 7.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 O-Bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile
87868 RPL10AP2 -0.65 8.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 HNRNPA1P64 -0.65 8.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 RPL34P18 -0.65 8.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
32982 SRRM1 -0.60 8.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Curcumin
643023 FBXL2 0.66 8.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Alpha-Phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile
742020 RSL24D1 -0.59 9.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte
236613 G6PD 0.59 9.0e-07 0.027 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
87868 HNRNPA1P55 -0.65 1.0e-06 0.027 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
309909 NPM3 -0.60 1.0e-06 0.027 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
742022 PFN4 0.59 1.0e-06 0.027 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
87868 RPS4XP8 -0.64 1.0e-06 0.027 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 RPS4XP1 -0.64 1.2e-06 0.030 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
309909 RPS10P5 -0.59 1.2e-06 0.030 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
643023 ETNK2 0.65 1.4e-06 0.031 Subtree 3 Alpha-Phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile
742020 HNRNPA1P4 -0.59 1.4e-06 0.031 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte
309909 HNRNPA1L2 -0.59 1.4e-06 0.031 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
742019 ITGAV 0.59 1.4e-06 0.031 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin tribenzimidazolmethylcarbonte
742020 RPL27AP -0.58 1.4e-06 0.031 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte
643769 RPSA -0.64 1.5e-06 0.032 Subtree 3 O-Bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile
742019 RPL21P44 -0.58 1.5e-06 0.032 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin tribenzimidazolmethylcarbonte
236613 SRXN1 0.58 1.7e-06 0.034 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
365798 TSKU 0.64 1.8e-06 0.036 Subtree 3 Piceatannol
705537 SGF29 0.60 1.8e-06 0.036 Subtree 3 Daturaolone
742022 PDCD11 -0.58 1.9e-06 0.036 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
87868 RPS4XP2 -0.63 1.9e-06 0.036 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
32982 HDAC10 -0.58 1.9e-06 0.036 Subtree 3 Curcumin
742020 EEF1B2P1 -0.58 2.0e-06 0.037 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte
742019 LINC00472 0.58 2.0e-06 0.037 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin tribenzimidazolmethylcarbonte
742021 HMBOX1 -0.58 2.2e-06 0.039 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri adamantylaminoethylcarbonate
309909 NOLC1 -0.58 2.2e-06 0.039 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
643023 REEP3 0.64 2.3e-06 0.040 Subtree 3 Alpha.-Phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile
87868 RPS4XP19 -0.63 2.4e-06 0.040 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
32982 NOC2L -0.58 2.4e-06 0.041 Subtree 3 Curcumin
309909 RPL34P18 -0.58 2.4e-06 0.041 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
87868 MYC -0.63 2.6e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
236613 ALDH3A2 0.57 2.7e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
32982 RCC2P4 -0.58 2.7e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Curcumin
32982 KHDRBS1 -0.58 2.8e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Curcumin
32982 DFFB -0.58 2.8e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Curcumin
87868 HNRNPA1P35 -0.62 3.0e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
643023 CAPN2 0.63 3.0e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Alpha.-Phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile
309909 ANLN 0.57 3.0e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
32982 AHNAK2 0.57 3.1e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Curcumin
236613 LOC344887 0.57 3.1e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
309909 HNRNPA1P64 -0.57 3.2e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
309909 EIF4BP9 -0.57 3.2e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
309909 RPL29P7 -0.57 3.2e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
742022 LOC100128816 -0.57 3.2e-06 0.043 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
742022 CUEDC1 0.57 3.3e-06 0.044 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
32982 CLIP4 0.57 3.3e-06 0.045 Subtree 3 Curcumin
112166 CRKL 0.61 3.4e-06 0.045 Subtree 3 Cucurbitacin K
236613 PGRMC1 0.57 3.4e-06 0.045 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
742019 RPL21P12 -0.57 3.5e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin tribenzimidazolmethylcarbonte
32982 ATAD3A -0.57 3.7e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Curcumin
236613 LRRC8A 0.57 3.7e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
236613 AFAP1 0.57 3.8e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
742022 CAMSAP2 0.56 3.9e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
236613 NEU3 -0.56 3.9e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
742019 RPS11P1 -0.56 3.9e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin tribenzimidazolmethylcarbonte
643023 MT2P1 0.63 4.1e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Alpha-Phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile
309909 ACTN4P1 0.57 4.1e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
309909 IKZF5 -0.57 4.2e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
87868 RPL34P31 -0.61 4.2e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
742019 FIGN 0.56 4.3e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin tribenzimidazolmethylcarbonte
236613 ELP2 -0.56 4.4e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
309909 HNRNPCP3 -0.57 4.4e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
643769 RPSAP47 -0.61 4.4e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 O-Bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile
309909 MTPAP -0.57 4.4e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
742020 RPL21P120 -0.56 4.5e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte
742022 CRACR2A -0.56 4.5e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
236613 NQO1 0.56 4.5e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
643769 RPS10 -0.61 4.5e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 O-Bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile
705537 PDGFC -0.58 4.6e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Daturaolone
742022 DARS -0.56 4.6e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
236613 ANXA2P1 0.56 4.7e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Plumbagin
309909 EIF4BP5 -0.57 4.7e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
87868 PDSS1 -0.61 4.7e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
309909 RPL7AP12 -0.56 4.8e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
383468 RCC2P4 -0.56 4.8e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Andrographis Paniculata
32982 RASAL2 0.56 4.8e-06 0.046 Subtree 3 Curcumin
309909 RPL34P31 -0.56 5.0e-06 0.047 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
87868 COL4A1 0.61 5.0e-06 0.047 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
309909 SFXN2 -0.56 5.0e-06 0.047 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
643769 HNRNPM -0.61 5.2e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 O-Bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile
87868 PDGFD 0.61 5.2e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 RPL36AP39 -0.61 5.2e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 HNRNPA1P13 -0.61 5.3e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
309909 SNORA14B -0.56 5.3e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
87868 BICC1 0.61 5.4e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 PRSS23 0.61 5.4e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
742022 RPL6 -0.56 5.5e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 curcumin tri trithiadiazolaminoethylcarbonate
87868 RPL34P6 -0.61 5.5e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
87868 HNRNPA1P8 -0.61 5.5e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Phenethyl mustard oil
309909 TAF5 -0.56 5.6e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
32982 PRTG 0.56 5.6e-06 0.048 Subtree 3 Curcumin
643023 ITGA3 0.62 5.7e-06 0.049 Subtree 3 Alpha.-Phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile
643769 CTSD 0.61 5.7e-06 0.049 Subtree 3 O-Bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile
309909 GALNT10 0.56 5.8e-06 0.049 Subtree 3 Nimbolide
742020 TFAP4 -0.56 6.0e-06 0.050 Subtree 3 Ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte
309909 RPL10AP2 -0.56 6.0e-06 0.050 Subtree 3 Nimbolide

Listed are the genes whose expression was associated with logGI50 of INPs with FDR adjusted p < 0.05. For each product, the subtree from hierarchical clustering shown in Fig. 1 is provided. The product of Ricinus communis (NSC 15384) was not included in the hierarchical clustering as its screening concentration units differed from all other INPs. ρ, Spearman correlation coefficient

SLC7A11 and plumbagin (NSC 688284)

SLC7A11 (solute carrier family 7 member 11) has recently been suggested as potential drug target in pancreatic adenocarcinoma [37]. It plays a role in maintaining cellular glutathione levels via cystine uptake, protecting cells from oxidative stress induced death and is commonly overexpressed in cancer, which has been linked to chemoresistance in many anti-tumor agents [3841]. Deletion of the SLC7A11 gene in genetically engineered mice with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma induced tumor-selective ferroptosis and inhibited tumor growth [40]. Targeting of the SLC7A11/glutathione axis with sulfasalazine has been shown to cause synthetic lethality via decreased cystine uptake and intracellular glutathione biosynthesis [42]. Alternative strategies leveraging this metabolic addiction have also been demonstrated via inhibiting glucose uptake preventing the conversion of potentially toxic cystine to cysteine [38, 43]. This highly positive correlation (Spearman correlation coefficient ρ = 0.79, unadjusted p value = 1.07 × 10–13, FDR adjusted p value = 8.47 × 10–8) demonstrates increased resistance of tumor cell lines to plumbagin associated with increased gene expression of SLC7A11, which is consistent with the previous findings by our group and other authors about the potential role of this transporter in resistance to multiple antitumor agents and natural products [29, 38, 42, 44].

ATAD family and curcumin

ATAD3A and ATAD3B are mitochondrial ATPase proteins expressed in embryogenesis. ATAD3B has been shown to be over-expressed in head and neck cancer and hepatocellular carcinoma [45, 46]. Curcumin acts as a protonorphic uncoupler of oxidative phosphorylation decreasing ATP biosynthesis which alters the AMP:ATP ratio and ultimately decreases cell proliferation [47]. The negative correlation for both ATAD3A (Spearman correlation coefficient ρ = -0.57, unadjusted p value = 3.68 × 10–6, FDR adjusted p value = 0.04) and ATAD3B (Spearman ρ = -0.67, unadjusted p value = 1.29 × 10–8, FDR adjusted p value = 3.4 × 10–3) genes demonstrates that increased sensitivity of cell lines to curcumin (i.e., lower logGI50 values) was associated with increased expression of the ATAD3A and ATAD3B genes.

MYB and phyllanthoside

MYB, a transcriptional activator, is a proto-oncogene that has been shown to be over-expressed in hematologic, colorectal, and breast cancer [48]. The negative correlation (Spearman correlation coefficient ρ = -0.66, unadjusted p value = 1.69 × 10–8, FDR adjusted p value = 3.84 × 10–3) demonstrates an association between increased sensitivity of cell lines to phyllanthoside and increased expression of the MYB gene. This suggests a potential role of MYB-mediated transcriptional regulation in response to this INP.

Biological pathway analysis

The results of pathway analysis using g:Profiler are presented in Supplementary Tables 13 and summarized in a graphical format in Supplementary Fig. 5. Below we discuss the pathways and molecular functions that were identified for Subtrees 1 and 3. Subtree 2 was not evaluable due to a paucity of significant genes.

Biological pathway analysis using g:Profiler identified several biological pathways and functions which may be associated with increased sensitivity or resistance to INPs. Among the INPs in Subtree 1, resistance to NSC number 328426 (phyllanthoside), 342443 (S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside), 94743 (cucurbitacin A), 143925 (pekilocerin A), 112167 (elatericin B) was associated with pathways related to mineral homeostasis (Supplementary Table 1). Due to an insufficient number of genes associated with sensitivity to INPs in Subtree 1, common biological processes for those genes and INPs could not be evaluated.

Subtree 3

Among the INPs in Subtree 3, response to NSC number 236613 (plumbagin), 643023 (alpha-phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile), 365798 (piceatannol), 112166 (cucurbitacin K) and sensitivity to 32982 (curcumin), 309909 (nimbolide), 87868 (phenethyl mustard oil), 742021 (curcumin tri adamantylaminoethylcarbonate), 742019 (ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte), 705537 (daturaolone), 643769 (O-bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile), 383468 (product of Andrographis paniculata) was associated with expression of genes involved in several molecular pathways (Supplementary Tables 2 and 3). Molecular functions associated with drug response in Subtree 3 include nucleic acid binding, heterocyclic compound binding, organic cyclic compound binding, and multiple aspects of protein synthesis including various stages of translation and structural components of the ribosome.

Nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (NRF2) pathway

NRF2 is a key transcription factor and a key modulator of cellular antioxidant response which has a role in preventing carcinogenesis. However, persistent activation of NRF2 has been demonstrated in some tumor types, which raises a possibility of its role in cancer proliferation [49]. As expression of the genes in this pathway was positively correlated with the INPs in Subtree 3, this suggests that resistance mechanisms to these INPs may be related to the NRF2 pathway [50].

PI3K-Akt-mTOR pathway

Overactivation of the PI3K-Akt-mTOR signaling pathway has been demonstrated in many different cancer types as a mechanism for tumor growth and therapeutic resistance [51]. As the pathway analysis of expression of the genes in this pathway found a positive correlation with logGI50 of the INPs in Subtree 3, this suggests that resistance mechanisms to the INPs such as NSC number 236613 (plumbagin), 643023 (alpha-phenyl-2,5-dimethoxy-alpha-cinnamonitrile), 365798 (piceatannol) and 112166 (cucurbitacin K) may be related to the PI3K-Akt-mTOR signaling. Subtree 3 contained several curcumin INPs and gallocatechin, which have been previously demonstrated to be associated with this pathway [52].

Eukaryotic translation pathway

A crucial component of cancer progression is translational control of protein synthesis through a increased rates of protein synthesis and specific mRNAs that promote increased tumor cell growth and survival [53]. As the pathway analysis of expression of genes in this pathway found a negative correlation with logGI50 of the INPs in Subtree 3, this suggests that sensitivity mechanisms to these INPs may be related to pathways associated with protein synthesis inhibition. Subtree 3 contained several curcumin-related INPs which have been previously demonstrated to have an association with these pathways [54].

Slit/Robo pathway

While the Slit/Robo pathway mainly involves functions to promote axon branching and neuronal migration, it is also involved in other physiological processes including angiogenesis and apoptosis [55]. Promoter hypermethylation of Slit/Robo has been observed in many different cancers, leading to undetectable or low levels of Slit/Robo, and natural products that reactivate this pathway via demethylation or other mechanisms are actively being explored [55]. Increased expression of genes in this pathway was negatively correlated with logGI50 of several INPs in Subtree 3, including NSC number 32982 (curcumin), 309909 (nimbolide), 87868 (phenethyl mustard oil), 742021 (curcumin tri adamantylaminoethylcarbonate), 742020 (ethoxycurcumin trithiadiazolaminomethylcarbonte), 705537 (daturaolone), 643769 (O-bromo-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrile), and 383468 (product of Andrographis paniculata), suggesting that overexpression of those genes may confer increased sensitivity to these products. This association indicates that such INPs could be explored to target this pathway. Curcumin and its related analogues have been demonstrated to also have a demethylating effect [56].

Association of cell line response to INPs with protein-changing single nucleotide variants

For each of the 75 INPs, and using whole exome sequencing data for the cell lines from CellMiner after filtering, we used a Student’s t-test to analyze the differences between logGI50 values comparing cell lines with and without individual protein-changing single nucleotide variants in each of the 107 genes listed in OncoKB. After FDR adjustment, 13 SNV-INP pairs satisfied the FDR adjusted p value < 0.05, including 4 unique genes and 10 unique natural products. Below we discuss examples of associations of functionally important variants and likely oncogenic variants from OncoKB (Table 3 and Supplementary Fig. 6).

Table 3.

Association of functionally important variants and likely oncogenic variants with response to Indian natural products

NSC number Gene Variant p-value t-statistic # of cell lines with variant # of cell lines without variant Mean logGI50 with variant Mean logGI50 without variant Prevalence in 1000 Genomes SNP Type OncoKB level OncoKB annotation FDR adjusted p-value INP name
112166 MET T992I 0.0000368 -4.782802 3 47 -5.806500 -5.703000 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0027367 Cucurbitacin K
112167 MET T992I 0.0006802 -3.743424 3 47 -6.801167 -6.709511 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0243927 Elatericin B
308606 BRAF V600E 0.0000006 -6.134195 9 41 -7.159667 -6.693878 0.00 Missense 1 Oncogenic 0.0000742 Cucurbitacin D
328426 KDR C482R 0.0019152 -3.308867 3 56 -8.222667 -7.909268 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0414968 Phyllanthoside
643160 MET T992I 0.0001938 4.076171 3 44 -4.000000 -4.145977 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0089764 3-Bromo-4-dimethylamino-alpha-benzoyl cinnamonitrite
710351 KDR C482R 0.0017855 3.286695 3 55 -4.000000 -4.137891 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0406327 Achilleol A
710351 MET T992I 0.0017855 3.286695 3 55 -4.000000 -4.137891 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0406327 Achilleol A
717335 MET T992I 0.0000616 -4.338376 3 55 -7.993333 -7.741146 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0042724 Tylophorin
717335 KNSTRN A40E 0.0017579 -3.300053 7 51 -7.954286 -7.726725 0.06 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0406327 Tylophorin
731920 KNSTRN A40E 0.0007237 -3.790673 7 42 -4.671286 -4.511429 0.06 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0250871 Calendulaglycoside B-6'-O-butyl ester
731921 KDR C482R 0.0014349 -3.902824 3 48 -5.905667 -5.644375 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0406327 Calendulaglycoside D2
731922 KDR C482R 0.0017287 -3.535183 3 47 -5.191333 -5.088383 0.01 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0406327 Calendulaglycoside D-6'-O-methyl ester
731922 KNSTRN A40E 0.0010801 -3.482230 7 43 -5.183857 -5.080023 0.06 Missense NA Likely Oncogenic 0.0351046 Calendulaglycoside D-6'-O-methyl ester

NSC INP NSC number, Gene Gene name, Variant Sequence variant, p-value original p-value (prior to adjustment for multiple testing) from the Student’s t-test comparing the mean logGI50 values in those cell lines that had each variant to those that were not reported to have the variant, t-statistic value from the Student’s t-test comparing the mean logGI50 values in those cell lines that had each variant to those that were not reported to have the variant, # of cell lines with variant Number of NCI-60 cell lines which had that variant according to information from CellMiner, # of cell lines without variant number of NCI-60 cell lines which were not reported to have that variant according to data from CellMiner, Mean logGI50 with variant Average logGI50 value in NCI-60 cell lines that had the variant, Mean logGI50 without variant average logGI50 value in NCI-60 cell lines not reported to have the variant, Prevalence in 1000 Genomes Frequency of the variant in the 1000 Genomes dataset, according to CellMiner, OncoKB level Highest level of evidence for the variant across tissues according to the OncoKB annotation; OncoKB annotation, OncoKB classification as oncogenic or likely oncogenic, FDR adjusted p-value, p-value (adjusted for multiple testing) from the Student’s t-test comparing the mean logGI50 values in those cell lines that had each variant to those that were not reported to have the variant; INP name, name of the Indian natural product

BRAF V600E and Cucurbitacin D (NSC 308606)

OncoKB lists BRAF V600E as a level 1 actionable variant, which was present in 9 cell lines (7 melanoma and 2 colorectal cell lines) in the NCI-60 dataset. Tumors with this variant are responsive to treatment with BRAF inhibitors (e.g., dabrafenib, vemurafenib) and in combination with MEK inhibitors this has been shown to be an effective treatment strategy for melanoma [57]. Consistent with our earlier analysis of a separate large natural product dataset [29], mean logGI50 response to cucurbitacin D was statistically significantly different when comparing cell lines without the BRAF V600E variant (mean = -6.69) to those with this variant (mean = -7.16, unadjusted p value = 5.71 × 10–7; FDR adjusted p value = 7.42 × 10–5). This association suggests that cucurbitacin D may have a role in targeting cancers with BRAF mutations or having an effect on BRAF [58]. Alternatively, the presence of BRAF V600E in most of the melanoma lines (8 out of 9 melanoma cell lines) may suggest that this INP may have a more general effect on growth inhibition in melanoma.

Likely oncogenic or likely gain of function variants

Multiple INPs were significantly associated with likely oncogenic individual variants listed in OncoKB in the KDR and KNSTRN genes (C482R and A40E, respectively) and the likely gain of function variant T992I in MET.

The receptor tyrosine kinase MET gene variant T992I was associated with sensitivity to multiple INPs, including products from the cucurbitacin family (Curcurbitacin K; NSC 112166, Elatericin B; NSC 112167) and the Tylophorine family (tylophorin, NSC 717335) and resistance to other products (3-bromo-4-dimethylamino-.alpha.-benzoyl cinnamonitrite; NSC 643160, achilleol A; NSC 710351).

The likely oncogenic, likely gain of function KDR gene variant C482R was associated with sensitivity to two INPs from the Calendula family (calendulaglycoside D2; NSC 731921, calendulaglycoside D-6'-O-methyl ester; NSC 731922) and the Phyllanthus family (phyllathoside, NSC 328426) and resistance to achilleol A (NSC 710351).

The likely oncogenic, likely gain of function kinetochore KNSTRN gene variant A40E was associated with sensitivity to three INPs (tylophorin; NSC 717335, calendulaglycoside B-6'-O-butyl ester; NSC 731920 and calendulaglycoside D-6'-O-methyl ester; NSC 731922).

Discussion

In this study, we used in vitro data to examine the associations of variation in gene expression and deleterious mutations with tumor cell response to INPs. We also compared response patterns to those of reference compounds as a preliminary investigation of the possible mechanisms of action of these products at the cellular level. We reported the findings that were highly significant after the correction for multiple comparisons. We compared publicly available cancer cell line response data in the NCI-60 panel for 75 INPs to data for standard reference antitumor compounds. Our joint analysis of molecular data and measures of cell line response to INPs and the comparison of the cytotoxic effects of INPs to those of established antitumor reference compounds allowed us to quantitively assess the potential involvement of individual genes and molecular pathways in tumor cell response to INPs. In Supplementary Figs. 46, we provide the summary of significant associations between the logGI50 measures of cancer cell line response to 75 INPs and molecular features of the tumor cells including gene expression, biological pathways, and single nucleotide variants in cancer-related genes.

Subtree 1 from the clustering of logGI50 values of INPs and reference compounds consisted of many products with anti-mitotic mechanisms of action, confirming previously reporting anti-mitotic activity of some INPs including phyllanthoside, S3’-desacetyl-phyllanthoside and the cucurbitacin family[13, 34]. Overall, the logGI50 response data were closely grouped among similar products, including cucurbitacins in Subtree 1, and curcumin and curcuminoids in Subtree 3.

Our analysis found multiple novel associations between gene expression and logGI50 values of INPs, including a highly significant association between increased levels of SLC7A11 expression and resistance to plumbagin. This resistance may involve increased SLC7A11 expression inhibiting ferroptosis, a distinct form of cell death due to excessive lipid peroxidation [43]. To our knowledge, our observed association between increased levels of ATAD3A/ ATAD3B expression and sensitivity to curcumin has not been previously reported. The products of these genes, ATPase family AAA domain containing 3A and 3B proteins, are involved in multi-protein complexes associated with mtDNA that are important for regulation of mitochondrial biogenesis and lipogenesis. Curcumin has been reported to regulate expression of enzymes involved in mitochondrial biogenesis and mitochondrial oxidative stress, to increase apoptosis and autophagic cell death, and to reduce cellular proliferation [5962]. The association with ATAD3A and ATAD3B expression may be of interest since ATAD3 over-expression has been linked to the progression of head and neck cancer, lung adenocarcinoma, non‑Hodgkin's lymphoma, uterine cancer, cervical cancer, prostate cancer, glioma, and hepatocellular carcinoma [46, 63, 64]. Interestingly, prior reports suggested the roles of increased ATAD3 expression in chemoresistance [46].

Our analysis of SNV variants demonstrated a statistically significant association of BRAF V600E with logGI50 measure of response to cucurbitacin D. The triterpene compounds from the Cucurbitaceae family, which include cucurbitacin D, are found in many gourd species. While they have demonstrated cytotoxicity in many cell lines, our finding of increased sensitivity in BRAF V600E mutated cell lines which includes almost all the melanoma cell lines in our dataset may warrant further investigation.

Paucity of INPs available in the public domain and consequently their underrepresentation in the NCI-60 cell line database limited our ability to evaluate some of the more commonly used Ayurvedic concoctions and herbs of interest including Triphala, Momordica charantia, and Withania somnifera. Additional open-source natural products databases [6567] contain more INPs; however, the available NCI-60 screening data for these additional products in the DTP dataset were limited to single dose data and were not analyzed in our study.

We used logGI50 values as the primary response endpoint because many previous studies have shown these measures to be a relevant outcome to study associations with molecular targets. When using logGI50 values, clusters of compounds derived from logGI50 values have been shown to correlate well both with potential mechanism of cell line response and with similarities among compound structures [18, 28, 29, 6870].

We used median logGI50 derived from the five-range dose screen as our measure of cell line response for the analysis of associations with molecular features of tumor cell lines. While this single logGI50 measure is informative in characterizing the cytotoxic effect of individual products, it may not reflect the cytotoxicity of the compound if it fell outside the pre-defined range of activity, in which case this measure would not reflect low levels of activity of some of the compounds we analyzed. As we analyzed pre-treatment gene expression levels for each cancer cell line, our findings cannot characterize the association between cell line response and post-treatment gene expression changes in response to each INP or reference compound. Such analyses may be of potential benefit in the future if post-treatment response data for Indian natural products become available. As the NCI-60 panel does not include normal cell lines for comparison, we did not focus on toxicity of these compounds and further studies will need to examine the side effects of these INPs.

As a note of caution, our findings do not indicate clinical efficacy but rather our study is an attempt to characterize available INPs and identify possible mechanisms of action for further study. In this analysis, utilization of the in vitro molecular screening data from the NCI-60 allowed us to identify molecular features of tumor cells associated with response to INPs. As Ayurvedic products are often used in specific combinations, our analysis would not be able to evaluate their clinical and immunomodulatory features associated with response to the combinations of such agents. Additionally, due to the limited representation of tumors and mutational features in the NCI-60 panel, we could not examine the response within individual cancer categories. Additional models including mouse patient-derived xenografts or other clinically relevant approaches may be needed to further investigate the physiological effects of Ayurvedic products in specific tumor types.

Conclusions

Our analysis examining NCI60 response patterns for 75 INPs and standard reference compounds and their similarities allowed us to elucidate potential common mechanisms of action and molecular features associated with response to these INPs. We identified a number of genes and several biological pathways that were associated with sensitivity and resistance to specific INPs and/or entire INP clusters. Our findings provide a proof of principle that INPs may represent compounds of interest for cancer drug discovery and further studies should increase our understanding of their possible mechanisms of action.

Supplementary Information

12885_2022_9580_MOESM1_ESM.pdf (644KB, pdf)

Additional file 1. Supplementary Figure 1. Heatmap of median logGI50 values of Indian natural products and reference compounds. Each row represents an Indian natural product or a standard reference compound and each column represents a cell line in the NCI-60 cancer cell line panel. The color key represents the logGI50 levels with negative values (blue) representing sensitivity of a cell line to the product and positive values (red) representing resistance to a product. Missing data are represented as black. The range of logGI50 values was -12.5 to -0.25 molar units.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM2_ESM.pdf (66.2KB, pdf)

Additional file 2. Supplementary Figure 2. Hierarchical clustering of INPs and reference compounds based on their median logLC50 values across NCI60 cell lines. The tree was inferred using the UPGMA (‘average’) method and was based on Euclidean distances. The tree is presented as an unrooted radial phylogram. The scale in the top left corner is provided for the branch lengths, which were derived from Euclidean distances. Clustered products are displayed with sparse labeling, in which only a random subset of INP labels is displayed.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM3_ESM.pdf (60KB, pdf)

Additional file 3. Supplementary Figure 3. Hierarchical clustering of INPs and reference compounds based on their median total growth inhibition (TGI) values across NCI60 cell lines. The tree was inferred using the UPGMA (‘average’) method and was based on Euclidean distances. The tree is presented as an unrooted radial phylogram. The scale in the top left corner is provided for the branch lengths, which were derived from Euclidean distances. Clustered products are displayed with sparse labeling, in which only a random subset of INP labels is displayed.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM4_ESM.png (2.9MB, png)

Additional file 4. Supplementary Figure 4. Graphical overview of significant associations logGI50 of Indian natural products with gene expression. Shown are significant associations with FDR adjusted p < 0.05, which are listed in Table 2. INPs are presented by colored circles, with colors corresponding to their subtree assignment based on clustering of their logGI50 values (orange for subtree 1, red for subtree 2, and purple for subtree 3). The subtree assignment of the INPs based on the logGI50 values is shown in Fig. 1, Supplementary Fig. 1, Table 1, and Supplementary Table 5. The direction of the arrows corresponds to the negative or positive values of the Spearman correlation coefficient ρ of association between gene expression and logGI50. An arrow toward an INP indicates ρ > 0, when higher gene expression was associated with higher logGI50 values and increased cell line resistance to that INP, whereas an arrow toward a gene indicates ρ < 0, showing that higher gene expression was associated with lower logGI50 values and with increased cell line sensitivity to that INP.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM5_ESM.pdf (2.7MB, pdf)

Additional file 5. Supplementary Figure 5. Graphical overview of significant associations of logGI50 of Indian natural product subtrees 1 and 3 with molecular pathways from Reactome, KEGG, and WikiPathways. Shown are significant associations identified by g:Profiler with FDR adjusted p < 0.05. (A) Positive associations for Subtree 1. (B) Positive associations for Subtree 3. (C) Negative associations for Subtree 3. Additional information about each association shown in the Figure is provided in Supplementary Tables 1-3.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM6_ESM.png (849.2KB, png)

Additional file 6. Supplementary Figure 6. Graphical overview of significant associations of logGI50 of Indian natural products with protein-changing SNVs in cancer-related genes, which are listed in Table 3. Shown are significant associations with FDR adjusted p < 0.05. INPs are presented by colored circles, with colors corresponding to their subtree assignment based on clustering of their logGI50 values shown in Fig. 1, Supplementary Fig. 1, and Table 1 (orange for subtree 1, red for subtree 2, and purple for subtree 3). The direction of the arrows corresponds to the negative or positive values of the t-statistic in the Student’s t-test. An arrow toward an INP indicates a positive value of the t-statistic, suggesting increased cell line resistance to that INP in the presence of a variant. In contrast, an arrow toward a variant indicates a negative value of the t-statistic, suggesting increased cell line sensitivity to that INP in the presence of a variant.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM7_ESM.pdf (18.2KB, pdf)

Additional file 7. Supplementary Table 1: Positively correlated pathways in Subtree 1

12885_2022_9580_MOESM8_ESM.pdf (59.3KB, pdf)

Additional file 8. Supplementary Table 2: Positively correlated pathways in Subtree 3

12885_2022_9580_MOESM9_ESM.pdf (87.7KB, pdf)

Additional file 9. Supplementary Table 3: Negatively correlated pathways in Subtree 3

12885_2022_9580_MOESM10_ESM.pdf (62.1KB, pdf)

Additional file 10. Supplementary Table 4: All queried Ayurvedic INPs from the PUBLIC COMPARE portal

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Additional file 11. Supplementary Table 5: Concordance between the clustering of Indian natural products and reference compounds based on logGI50, logLC50, and TGI values

Acknowledgements

The content of this publication does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the Department of Health and Human Services, nor does mention of trade names, commercial products, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. Government. We thank the editor, Dr. Alok C Bharthi, and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful suggestions. We also thank Dr. Barry O’Keefe from the NCI Natural Products Branch for helpful discussions about the analysis of natural products and INP. We also thank Dr. Mark Kunkel (DTP, NCI) for assistance with the NCI COMPARE program and for information about NCI DTP databases. We are grateful to Dr. Ana Best (Biometric Research Program, NCI) for helpful discussions and to Dr. Alida Palmisano (General Dynamics Information Technology contractor for the Biometric Research Program, NCI) for assistance with variant annotation of the NCI-60 cell lines.

Abbreviations

ROS

Reactive oxygen species

SNVs

Single nucleotide variants

NCI

National Cancer Institute

BRP

Biometric Research Program

TGI

Total growth inhibition

FDR

False discovery rate

WES

Whole exome sequencing

SLC7A11

Solute carrier family 7 member 11

NRF2

Nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2

PDX

Patient-derived xenograft

Authors' contributions

HS, YZ, LMM, JK conceived the study. SN prepared and processed NCI-60 gene expression and SNV data. HS prepared and processed response data for INPs and reference compounds. HS, JK, and YZ carried out the bioinformatic analysis of molecular genomic measures and their association with INP sensitivity, and drafted the manuscript. LMM provided statistical expertise and oversaw the statistical and computational analysis of the data. All authors participated in the interpretation of study results and read, edited, and approved the final manuscript.

Funding

Open Access funding provided by the National Institutes of Health (NIH)

Availability of data and materials

All response data for the INPs and the reference compounds used in this analysis are publicly available at the DTP PUBLIC COMPARE portal (https://dtp.cancer.gov/public_compare) [24, 25]. NCI-60 expression and single nucleotide variant data are publicly available from the CellMiner and CellMinerCDB online resources [22, 28].

Declarations

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Not applicable.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Footnotes

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Contributor Information

Hari Sankaran, Email: hari.sankaran@nih.gov.

Julia Krushkal, Email: julia.krushkal@nih.gov.

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Associated Data

This section collects any data citations, data availability statements, or supplementary materials included in this article.

Supplementary Materials

12885_2022_9580_MOESM1_ESM.pdf (644KB, pdf)

Additional file 1. Supplementary Figure 1. Heatmap of median logGI50 values of Indian natural products and reference compounds. Each row represents an Indian natural product or a standard reference compound and each column represents a cell line in the NCI-60 cancer cell line panel. The color key represents the logGI50 levels with negative values (blue) representing sensitivity of a cell line to the product and positive values (red) representing resistance to a product. Missing data are represented as black. The range of logGI50 values was -12.5 to -0.25 molar units.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM2_ESM.pdf (66.2KB, pdf)

Additional file 2. Supplementary Figure 2. Hierarchical clustering of INPs and reference compounds based on their median logLC50 values across NCI60 cell lines. The tree was inferred using the UPGMA (‘average’) method and was based on Euclidean distances. The tree is presented as an unrooted radial phylogram. The scale in the top left corner is provided for the branch lengths, which were derived from Euclidean distances. Clustered products are displayed with sparse labeling, in which only a random subset of INP labels is displayed.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM3_ESM.pdf (60KB, pdf)

Additional file 3. Supplementary Figure 3. Hierarchical clustering of INPs and reference compounds based on their median total growth inhibition (TGI) values across NCI60 cell lines. The tree was inferred using the UPGMA (‘average’) method and was based on Euclidean distances. The tree is presented as an unrooted radial phylogram. The scale in the top left corner is provided for the branch lengths, which were derived from Euclidean distances. Clustered products are displayed with sparse labeling, in which only a random subset of INP labels is displayed.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM4_ESM.png (2.9MB, png)

Additional file 4. Supplementary Figure 4. Graphical overview of significant associations logGI50 of Indian natural products with gene expression. Shown are significant associations with FDR adjusted p < 0.05, which are listed in Table 2. INPs are presented by colored circles, with colors corresponding to their subtree assignment based on clustering of their logGI50 values (orange for subtree 1, red for subtree 2, and purple for subtree 3). The subtree assignment of the INPs based on the logGI50 values is shown in Fig. 1, Supplementary Fig. 1, Table 1, and Supplementary Table 5. The direction of the arrows corresponds to the negative or positive values of the Spearman correlation coefficient ρ of association between gene expression and logGI50. An arrow toward an INP indicates ρ > 0, when higher gene expression was associated with higher logGI50 values and increased cell line resistance to that INP, whereas an arrow toward a gene indicates ρ < 0, showing that higher gene expression was associated with lower logGI50 values and with increased cell line sensitivity to that INP.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM5_ESM.pdf (2.7MB, pdf)

Additional file 5. Supplementary Figure 5. Graphical overview of significant associations of logGI50 of Indian natural product subtrees 1 and 3 with molecular pathways from Reactome, KEGG, and WikiPathways. Shown are significant associations identified by g:Profiler with FDR adjusted p < 0.05. (A) Positive associations for Subtree 1. (B) Positive associations for Subtree 3. (C) Negative associations for Subtree 3. Additional information about each association shown in the Figure is provided in Supplementary Tables 1-3.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM6_ESM.png (849.2KB, png)

Additional file 6. Supplementary Figure 6. Graphical overview of significant associations of logGI50 of Indian natural products with protein-changing SNVs in cancer-related genes, which are listed in Table 3. Shown are significant associations with FDR adjusted p < 0.05. INPs are presented by colored circles, with colors corresponding to their subtree assignment based on clustering of their logGI50 values shown in Fig. 1, Supplementary Fig. 1, and Table 1 (orange for subtree 1, red for subtree 2, and purple for subtree 3). The direction of the arrows corresponds to the negative or positive values of the t-statistic in the Student’s t-test. An arrow toward an INP indicates a positive value of the t-statistic, suggesting increased cell line resistance to that INP in the presence of a variant. In contrast, an arrow toward a variant indicates a negative value of the t-statistic, suggesting increased cell line sensitivity to that INP in the presence of a variant.

12885_2022_9580_MOESM7_ESM.pdf (18.2KB, pdf)

Additional file 7. Supplementary Table 1: Positively correlated pathways in Subtree 1

12885_2022_9580_MOESM8_ESM.pdf (59.3KB, pdf)

Additional file 8. Supplementary Table 2: Positively correlated pathways in Subtree 3

12885_2022_9580_MOESM9_ESM.pdf (87.7KB, pdf)

Additional file 9. Supplementary Table 3: Negatively correlated pathways in Subtree 3

12885_2022_9580_MOESM10_ESM.pdf (62.1KB, pdf)

Additional file 10. Supplementary Table 4: All queried Ayurvedic INPs from the PUBLIC COMPARE portal

12885_2022_9580_MOESM11_ESM.xlsx (17.7KB, xlsx)

Additional file 11. Supplementary Table 5: Concordance between the clustering of Indian natural products and reference compounds based on logGI50, logLC50, and TGI values

Data Availability Statement

All response data for the INPs and the reference compounds used in this analysis are publicly available at the DTP PUBLIC COMPARE portal (https://dtp.cancer.gov/public_compare) [24, 25]. NCI-60 expression and single nucleotide variant data are publicly available from the CellMiner and CellMinerCDB online resources [22, 28].


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