Gemcitabine/cannabinoid combination triggers autophagy in pancreatic cancer cells through a ROS-mediated mechanism

“Pancreatic adenocarcinoma is one of the most aggressive and devastating human malignancies with a death-to-incidence ratio of 0.99. Although it represents only 2–3% of all cancers, pancreatic adenocarcinoma is the fourth cause of death by tumors…

In recent years, there has been increasing interest in cannabinoids as therapeutic drugs for their antineoplastic, anticachectic, and analgesic potential. Growth inhibitory activities of cannabinoids have been demonstrated for various malignancies, including brain, breast, prostate, colorectal, skin and, recently, pancreatic cancer…

In the present study, we have demonstrated that the combination between the standard chemotherapy agent GEM and cannabinoids synergistically inhibited pancreatic adenocarcinoma cell growth by a ROS-dependent autophagic cell death.

These findings support a key role of the ROS-dependent activation of an autophagic program in the synergistic growth inhibition induced by GEM/cannabinoid combination in human pancreatic cancer cells.

GEM and cannabinoids strongly inhibited growth of human pancreatic adenocarcinoma cells in vivo.”

Read more: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3122066/