Anthocyanins-Smart Molecules for Cancer Prevention

Anthocyanins are one of the most widespread natural pigments in the plant kingdom. Being surrounded by so many fruits and vegetables rich in anthocyanins, it is recom-mended to consume a relatively large amount of them. A daily intake of anthocyanins has a certain demonstrated benefits: lowers the risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, arthritis, and cancer due, at least in part, to their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities. Lately, great attention is paid to their anticancer properties due to the need for user-friendly approaches to improve the treatment. So far, cancer had been nominated to be the second in top 10 diseases of the twenty-first century. Those colorful pigments have the ability to modulate the activity of multiple targets involved in carcinogenesis through direct interaction or modulation of gene expression and can also inhibit the growth of cancer cells. However, the main concern related to the use of anthocyanins as anticancer agents is their poor bioavailability, more specific poor absorption, and biodistribution. In this chapter, the anticancer activities of anthocyanins or anthocyanin-rich extracts in vitro or in vivo were reviewed. develop new products originating from natural sources with antioxidant and chemopreventive properties. The ability of anthocyanins to influence parameters of skin tumor development on mice was demonstrated in various studies. SKH-1 hairless mouse was used in order to investigate the photo-chemopreventive effect of delphinidin on UVB-induced biomarkers of skin cancer development After the treatment, the results sug-gest that delphinidin inhibited UVB-mediated oxidative stress and reduced DNA damage, thereby protecting the cells from UVB-induced apoptosis. The antitumor activity of the anthocyanins extract from Fructus Sorbi aucupariae on B-16 melanoma in C57BI/6 mice was also demonstrated ]. The study revealed an increase in the counts of stromal progenitor cells in the tumor node and their accelerated maturation. The potentiation of the antimeta static activity of the cytostatic was demonstrated as well. The inhibitory effects of mulberry anthocyanins on the metastasis of B16-F1 cells under noncytotoxic concentrations were investigated. The findings of the study have demonstrated that mulberry anthocyanins have strong anticancer effects by inhibiting the metastasis ability of B16-F1 cells. Further investigations revealed that the antimetastatic effect of these compounds was also evident in a C57BL/6 mice model.