Avaliação do efeito antitumoral de Cordyceps militaris em meio à base de melaço de cana-de-açúcar em camundongos com melanoma

Abstract

Cutaneous melanoma is a type of cancer that can be lethal, with a worse prognosis when it is not treated at the onset of the first symptoms of the disease. The medicinal fungus of the Cordyceps militaris type is an abundant source of natural products, consisting of several active components (polysaccharides, adenosine, ergosterol, etc.) and cordycepin, which has an antioxidant effect. Although the different forms of treatment have been well established in the literature, it is not yet known whether there is an antitumor effect of Cordyceps militaris extract in an alternative medium based on sugarcane molasses in an in vivo experimental model. Therefore, our objective was to measure the effect of Cordyceps militaris supernatant on biometric differentiation and tumor progression in mice with murine melanoma, in addition to evaluating whether these antitumor activities have a pharmacological impact on clinical/laboratory research. For this, we used four groups of animals implanted with B16F10 cells, which were divided into three groups: treated with daily injections of one of the three different doses of the supernatant and a group: control (no treatment) and we evaluated quantitative data using the GraphPad Prism software. ® (version 7.05). After analyzing the progression of body mass, we identified that from the third week onwards, the group treated with the high concentration of supernatant obtained the lowest weight in relation to the control group and maintained the trend of gradually increasing body mass. Furthermore, we observed that the three different treated groups showed slower tumor growth from the fourth day of treatment, regardless of dose, when compared to the untreated group. Our results indicate that administration of low and medium doses (p < 0.008 and p < 0.01, respectively) of the supernatants were significantly distinguishable in the reduction of the final tumor volume, when compared to the group of control animals. Finally, our study shows for the first time that it may be relevant to investigate that Cordyceps militaris supernatant in sugarcane molasses-based medium is promising to generate other, possible, treatments relevant to tumor development and progression.