Silibinin Cytotoxic Effect on MCF-7 Cell Line

Metastatic cancers, such as breast cancer, are generally resistant to chemotherapy. Therefore many researches try to find new and effective compounds to treat this type of cancer. In this study, we examined the Silibinin toxic effect on tumor growth and proliferation of MCF-7 cell line.
Materials & methods MTT assay was used to assess the inhibitory effect of silibinin on metabolic activity of MCF_7 cells. For this purpose, seeded cells were plated on to 96-well plates and then exposed to varying concentrations of silibinin (0-350 ug/mL) for different time (24, 48 and 72 h). The percentage of metabolic activity was calculated according to the MTT test. In next step, in order to evaluate the effect of silibinin on apoptosis in MCF_7 cells, Caspase 3/7 test was used.
Our results indicate that silibinin inhibited metabolic activity of MCF-7cells in a dose-dependent manner and it can induce apoptosis pathway in these cells.
The study showed that treatment of MCF-7 cell line with Silibinin can be through induction of apoptosis, inhabitation of the growth and proliferation of cells. Due to the significant inhibitory effect of silibinin on MCF-7 cells, it seems important for researchers to utilize milk thistle in the treatment and prevention of cancer.