Table 1.

Anticancer potential of berberine through modulating cell signaling pathways.

Cell lines	Genes/Pathways	Effects	Mechanism	Refs.
MDA-MB-231	Proinflammatory cytokines	Inhibited proinflammatory cytokines	Berberine meaningly decreased the increased expression of IL-6 and TNF-α. Furthermore, berberine inhibited NF-κB activation through inhibiting the degradation of IκBα.	[32]
MDA-MB-231	Proinflammatory cytokines	Inhibited proinflammatory cytokines	Berberine showed a significant decrease in the proinflammatory cytokines, interleukin, and tumor necrosis factor-α	[33]
MHCC97-L and HepG2	Apoptosis	Induced apoptosis	Berberine causes activation of mitochondrial apoptosis via enhancing expression of bax, activation of the caspases	[38]
MCF-7	Apoptosis	Induced apoptosis	Berberine treatment upregulates caspase 3 and 9 and downregulates the anti-apoptotic Bcl-2	[39]
Huh7 and WRL68	Apoptosis	Induced apoptosis	Berberine caused cell cycle arrest and increased the Bax expression	[41]
MCF-7/ADR cells	Autophagy	Inhibited autophagy	Berberine reverses doxorubicin resistance through preventing autophagy	[47]
U2OS, Saos-2 and HOS		Cell cycle arrest	The inhibition was mainly credited to cell cycle arrest at G1 and G2/M, and G1 arrest was dependent on p53	[52]
LoVo		Cell cycle arrest	Berberine-treatment displayed accumulation of cells in the G2/M phase	[53]
HCT116		Cell cycle arrest	G0/G1 phase arrest	[55]
HepG-2 and HUVECs		Inhibited vascular endothelial growth factor	Berberine downregulates expression VEGF mRNA and prevents secretion of vascular endothelial growth factor	[61]
SW480		Inhibited PI3K/Akt/mTOR	Berberine upregulated PTEN, and inhibited proteins of Akt, PI3K, and mTOR	[69]
SGC-7901 and BGC-823		Inhibited PI3K/AKT/mTOR	Berberine meaningfully repressed the PI3K/AKT/mTOR	[70]
HCT 116		Inhibited telomerase/TERT	Telomerase activity was decreased by berberine	[55]
A549		Targeted AP-2/hTERT,	Cancer cell growth was inhibited by berberine, which also directed AP-2/hTERT	[77]
HCT116		Inhibited Wnt/β-catenin	Berberine prevented Wnt/β-catenin signaling	[81]
PC-3 and LnCaP		Inhibited epidermal growth factor receptor	Proliferation of cancer cancer cells was inhibited by berberine via cell cycle arrest, and/or apoptosis by EGFR signaling pathway inactivation	[86]
PG		Inhibited Activator protein 1	Berberine repressed the c-Jun expression and reduced the transcription factors binding to the CCND1 AP-1 motif	[93]
HCT 116		Inhibited NF-κB	Berberine inhibits NF-κB activation	[98]
HepG2 and Huh7 cells		Suppressed Nrf2	Berberine supports radiosensitivity via Nrf2 signaling pathway suppression	[103]
C666-1		Inhibited signal transducer and activator of transcription 3	Berberine inhibited IL-6-induced STAT3 activation	[106]
A375		AMPK	Berberine induced AMPK activation	[110]
BGC-823		mTOR/MAPK	Berberine inhibited mTOR/MAPK/p70S6K	[111]