Anticancer Activity of Chitosan, Chitosan Derivatives, and Their Mechanism of Action

Table 3

Anticancer mechanism of action of HCT as a precursor of chitosan thiosemicarbazone and chitosan derivatives in some potential target cells.

Compounds	Target cells	Mechanism of action	Test	Outcome	Year	Ref.
HCT	L1210	Inhibition of RR activity	In vitro	Antineoplastic effect	1956-89	[119–126]
Chitosan copper(II) complex	293 and HeLa cells	Checkpoint-controlled progression of cell proliferation at S phase	In vitro	Inhibition of cellular proliferation	2006; 2000	[42]; [138]
Copper loaded chitosan nano particles	Osteocarcinoma	nano particles mediated enhanced permeation and retention (EPR) effect, increase in ROS level, DNA fragmentation and apoptosis	In vitro  and in vivo	Inhibition of tumor growth	2017; 2009; 2013; 2009	[96]; [139]; [140]; [141]
CMCS	HUVECs	Inhibition of extracellular matrix degradation and transformation of malignant cells	In vitro	Suppression of angiogenesis, decrease in VEGF and increase in TIMP1 levels	2015; 2009; 2007; 2007	[45]; [82]; [95]; [106]
	H-22	Necrosis due to cell distortion and disintegration of nuclei	In vivo	Inhibition of tumor growth	2015	[45]
	Solid tumor	Enhancement in IFN- γ and TNF- α levels, regulation of immune-related cytokines induction and immunoenhancement	In vivo  mice model	Increase in thymus index, tumor growth inhibition	2015	[45]
Chitosan thymine conjugate	HepG2	Inhibition of DNA synthesis, mRNA transcription and translation of the cancer-causing gene	In vitro	Inhibition of tumor growth	2012	[46]
SCS and SBCS	MCF-7 cells	Induction of apoptosis and blockade of the FGF-2-induced phosphorylation of ERK	In vitro	Inhibition of cells proliferation	2011	[47]
G-Chi- MMC and N-Suc-Chi -MMC conjugate	Solid tumors, leukemia, metastatic liver cancer	Sustained release of drug from conjugate	In vitro and in vivo	Higher antitumor effect and less side effects	2005	[48]
Furanoallocolchicinoid- chitosan conjugate	Wnt-1 breast tumor bearing mice	Tubulin reorganization, cell cycle arrest, sequestering of colchicine molecules.	In vivo	Inhibition of tumor cell proliferation and less side effects.	2016; 2015	[49]; [75]
3-Amino-2-phenyl-4(3H)-quinazolinone PPC-silver chloride nano composite	EAC and MCF-7	Sequestering of molecules from noncancer cells and sustained release to cancer cells with zero order kinetics	In vitro	Target delivery of nano particles	2017	[50, 51]