ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is considered as the third leading cause of cancer-related deaths, in spite of great advances in its treatment. The carbohydrate polymers, exopolysaccharides (EPSs), showed anticancer activity in diverse cancers. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study is to investigate a panel of 43 apoptotic proteins to assess the possible apoptotic induction effect of bacterial EPSs showing promising cytotoxic effects in HepG2 cells in our previous study, in an attempt to introduce exopolysaccharides as new source for cancer treatment. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Apoptosis-related proteins panel were examined through the analysis of Human Apoptosis Antibody Array-Membrane (43 targets). RESULTS: EPS-6 induces apoptosis through upregulation of different pro-apoptotic proteins as cytochrome C (9.52 fold) and tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand receptor (TRAIL-R1) (153.49 fold). EPS-RS induces apoptosis through up regulation of second mitochondria-derived activator of caspases (SMAC) (15.75 fold) and the six insulin-like growth factors binding proteins (IGFBP-1 through - 6) (76.81 fold, 7.68 fold, 55.15 fold, 4.9 × 107 fold, 29.69 fold, and 28.92 fold), respectively. CONCLUSION: Our results suggested that EPS-6 and EPS-RS could be considered as promising agents in hepatocellular carcinoma treatment.