TY - JOUR AB - Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the second leading cause of cancer death. Hence, there is a great need to explore new efficacious drugs for the treatment of CRC. Honokiol (HNK), a natural product extracted from magnolia bark, processes various biological activities, including anticancer. In this study, we introduced cell viability assay, western blotting, real-time PCR and immunofluorescent staining to determine the anticancer effect of HNK, and the possible mechanism underlying this biological process. We found that HNK can inhibit the proliferation and induce apoptosis in HCT116 cells in a concentration- and time-dependent manner. HNK activates p53 in HCT116 and other colon cancer cells. Exogenous p53 potentiates the anticancer of HNK, while p53 inhibitor decreases this effect of HNK. Moreover, HNK upregulates the expression of bone morphogenetic proteinĀ 7 (BMP7) in colon cancer cells; Exogenous BMP7 enhances the anticancer activity of HNK and BMP7 specific antibody reduces this effect of HNK. For mechanism, we found that HNK cannot increase the level of Smad1/5/8; Exogenous BMP7 potentiates the HNK-induced activation of p53. On the contrary, BMP7 specific antibody inhibits the HNK-induced activation of p53 in colon cancer cells and partly decreases the total level of p53. Our findings suggested that HNK may be a promising anticancer drug for CRC; activation of p53 plays an important role in the anticancer activity of HNK, which may be initialized partly by the HNK-induced upregulation of BMP7. AD - Department of Pharmacology, School of Pharmacy, Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing 400016, P.R. China Key Laboratory for Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology of Chongqing, Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing 400016, P.R. China AU - Liu,Rong-Xing AU - Ren,Wen-Yan AU - Ma,Yan AU - Liao,Yun-Peng AU - Wang,Han AU - Zhu,Jia-Hui AU - Jiang,Hai-Tao AU - Wu,Ke AU - He,Bai-Cheng AU - Sun,Wen-Juan DA - 2017/09/01 DO - 10.3892/ijo.2017.4078 EP - 917 IS - 3 JO - Int J Oncol KW - honokiol colon cancer anti-proliferation apoptosis p53 bone morphogenetic proteinĀ 7 PY - 2017 SN - 1019-6439 1791-2423 SP - 907 ST - BMP7 mediates the anticancer effect of honokiol by upregulating p53 in HCT116 cells T2 - International Journal of Oncology TI - BMP7 mediates the anticancer effect of honokiol by upregulating p53 in HCT116 cells UR - https://doi.org/10.3892/ijo.2017.4078 VL - 51 ER -