Ethyl-acetate extract of Spatholobi Caulis blocked the pro-metastatic support from the hemato-microenvironment of colon cancer by specific disruption of tumor-platelet adhesion.

BACKGROUND: Within the pro-metastatic hemato-microenvironment, interaction between platelets and tumor cells provides essential support for tumor cells by inducing Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition (EMT), which greatly increases the stemness of colon cancer cells. Pharmacologically, although platelet deactivation has proved to be benefit against metastasis, its wide application is severely restricted due to the bleeding risk. Spatholobi Caulis, a traditional Chinese herb with circulatory promotion and blood stasis removal activity, has been proved to be clinically effective in malignant medication, leaving its mechanistic relevance to tumor-platelet interaction largely unknown.

METHODS: Firstly, MC38-Luc cells were injected into tail-vein in C57BL/6 mice to establish hematogenous metastasis model and the anti-metastasis effects of SEA were evaluated by using a small-animal imaging system. Then, we evaluated the anti-tumor-platelet interaction efficacy of SEA using a tumor-specific induced platelet aggregation model. Platelet aggregation was specifically induced by tumor cells in vitro. Furthermore, to clarify the anti-metastatic effects of SEA is mainly attributed to its blockage on tumor-platelet interaction, after co-culture with tumor cells and platelets (with or without SEA), MC38-Luc cells were injected into the tail-vein and finally count the total of photons quantitatively. Besides, to clarify the blocking pattern of SEA within the tumor-platelet complex, the dependence of SEA on different fractions from activated platelets was tested. Lastly, molecular docking screening were performed to screen potential effective compounds and we used β-catenin blockers to verify the pathways involved in SEA blocking tumor-platelet interaction.

RESULTS: Our study showed that SEA was effective in blocking tumor-platelet specific interaction: (1) Through CCK-8 and LDH assays, SEA showed no cytotoxic effects on tumor cells and platelets. On this basis, by the tail vein injection model, the photon counts in the SEA group was significantly lower than model group, indicating that SEA effectively reduced metastasis. (2) In the "tumor-platelet" co-culture model, SEA effectively inhibited the progression of EMT and cancer stemness signatures of MC38 cells in the model group. (3) In mechanism study, by using the specific inhibitors for galectin-3 (GB1107) andWNT (IWR) respectively, we proved that SEA inhibits the activation of the galectin-3-mediated β-catenin activation.

CONCLUSION: By highlighting the pro-metastatic effects of galectin-3-mediated tumor-platelet adhesion, our study provided indicative evidence for Spatholobi Caulis as the representative candidate for anti-metastatic therapy.