Figure 9

α-santalol inhibits tumor growth, tumor angiogenesis and induced tumor apoptosis in a xenograft mouse model. PC-3 cells were injected into 6-week old BALB/cA nude mice (5 x 106 cells per mouse). After tumors grew to about 100 mm3, mice were treated intraperitoneally with or without α-santalol (7.5 and 15 mg/kg/d). (A, B) α-santalol significantly reduced tumor volume. (C) α-santalol didn’t have inhibitory effect on bodyweight of mice as compared to control group (D) Kaplan-Meier survival curve for α-santalol treated mice in comparison to control group (n = 10). (E) Cell proliferation was assessed by the presence of PCNA stained cells using immunohistochemical staining (stained brown in color). The number of PCNA-positively stained cells was quantified and expressed in terms of percentage of control group. (F) CD31 staining was done to study the blood vessels in tumor tissues. α-santalol significantly decreased CD31 positive cells in treated group in a dose-dependent manner versus vehicle control. MVD was determined by counting the number of microvessels per high-power field (hpf) in in selected vascularized areas divided by the whole area. (G) α-santalol significantly decreased p-VEGFR2 staining which was quantified and expressed in terms of percentage of control group. (H) Apoptosis was measured by TUNEL staining in tumor sections. The apoptotic index was calculated by dividing the number of TUNEL-positive cells by the total number of cells. The treatment with α-santalol resulted in significantly increased apoptosis in a dose-dependent manner versus vehicle control. Values are mean ± SEM (n = 6) of three independent experiments. **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001 versus vehicle control group.