Growth inhibition, cell-cycle dysregulation, and induction of apoptosis by green tea constituent (-)-epigallocatechin-3-gallate in androgen-sensitive and androgen-insensitive human prostate carcinoma cells.

Toxicol Appl Pharmacol 2000 Apr 1;164(1):82-90    

Gupta S; Ahmad N; Nieminen AL; Mukhtar H
Department of Dermatology, Department of Anatomy, Case Western Reserve University, 11100 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44106, USA.

Prostate cancer (PCA) is the most prevalent cancer diagnosed and the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths among men in the United States. Descriptive epidemiological data suggest that androgens and environmental exposures play a key role in prostatic carcinogenesis. Since androgen action is intimately associated with proliferation and differentiation, at the time of clinical diagnosis in humans most PCA represent themselves as a mixture of androgen-sensitive and androgen-insensitive cells. Androgen-sensitive cells undergo rapid apoptosis upon androgen withdrawal. On the other hand, the androgen-insensitive cells do not undergo apoptosis upon androgen blocking, but maintain the molecular machinery of apoptosis. Thus, agents capable of inhibiting growth and/or inducing apoptosis in both androgen-sensitive and androgen-insensitive cells will be useful for the management of PCA. In the present study, we show that (-)-epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG), the major polyphenolic constituent present in green tea, imparts antiproliferative effects against both androgen-sensitive and androgen-insensitive human PCA cells, and this effect is mediated by deregulation in cell cycle and induction of apoptosis. EGCG treatment was found to result in a dose-dependent inhibition of cell growth in both androgen-insensitive DU145 and androgen-sensitive LNCaP cells. In both the cell types, EGCG treatment also resulted in a dose-dependent G(0)/G(1)-phase arrest of the cell cycle as observed by DNA cell-cycle analysis. As evident by DNA ladder assay, confocal microscopy, and flow cytometry, the treatment of both DU145 and LNCaP cells with EGCG resulted in a dose-dependent apoptosis. Western blot analysis revealed that EGCG treatment resulted in (i) a dose-dependent increase of p53 in LNCaP cells (carrying wild-type p53), but not in DU145 cells (carrying mutant p53), and (ii) induction of cyclin kinase inhibitor WAF1/p21 in both cell types. These results suggest that EGCG negatively modulates PCA cell growth, by affecting mitogenesis as well as inducing apoptosis, in cell-type-specific manner which may be mediated by WAF1/p21-caused G(0)/G(1)-phase cell-cycle arrest, irrespective of the androgen association or p53 status of the cells.