The Publication:

Emodin reduces surgical wounding-accelerated tumor growth and metastasis via macrophage suppression in a murine triple-negative breast cancer model

Sounds like a mouthful? Don’t worry—there’s a summary below.

Publication Summary:

It has been suspected that tumor resection surgery itself may accelerate breast cancer (BC) lung metastasis in some patients. Emodin, a natural anthraquinone found in the roots and rhizomes of various plants, exhibits anticancer activity. We examined the effects of perioperative use of emodin in our established surgery wounding murine BC model (in this model, surgery was done without removing the tumors). Emodin reduced primary BC tumor growth and metastasis in the lungs in both control and surgical wounded mice, consistent with a reduction in proliferation and enhanced apoptosis of cancer cells in primary and lung metastatic tumors. Further, emodin reduced systemic inflammation, most notably the number of monocytes in the peripheral blood and pro-tumoral M2 macrophages in the primary tumors and the lungs. Consistently, we show that emodin reduces the expression of select macrophage markers and associated cytokines in the primary tumors and lungs of wounded mice. Overall, we demonstrate that emodin is beneficial in mitigating surgical wounding accelerated lung metastasis in a model of triple-negative BC, which appears to be mediated, at least in part, by its actions on macrophages. These data support the development of emodin as a safe, low-cost, and effective agent to be used perioperatively to alleviate the surgery triggered inflammatory response and consequential metastasis of BC to the lungs.