Development of Artemisinin Compounds for Cancer Treatment

Overview

Journal Invest New Drugs

Publisher Springer

Specialty Oncology

Date 2012 Sep 1

PMID 22935909

Citations 67

Authors

Henry C Lai

Narendra P Singh

Tomikazu Sasaki

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Artemisinin contains an endoperoxide moiety that can react with iron to form cytotoxic free radicals. Cancer cells contain significantly more intracellular free iron than normal cells and it has been shown that artemisinin and its analogs selectively cause apoptosis in many cancer cell lines. In addition, artemisinin compounds have been shown to have anti-angiogenic, anti-inflammatory, anti-metastasis, and growth inhibition effects. These properties make artemisinin compounds attractive cancer chemotherapeutic drug candidates. However, simple artemisinin analogs are less potent than traditional cancer chemotherapeutic agents and have short plasma half-lives, and would require high dosage and frequent administration to be effective for cancer treatment. More potent and target-selective artemisinin-compounds are being developed. These include artemisinin dimers and trimers, artemisinin hybrid compounds, and tagging of artemisinin compounds to molecules that are involved in the intracellular iron-delivery mechanism. These compounds are promising potent anticancer compounds that produce significantly less side effect than traditional chemotherapeutic agents.

Citing Articles

Therapeutic applications of artemisinin in ophthalmic diseases.

Sun H, Zhao P, Zhao L, Zhao Z, Chen H, Ren C Heliyon. 2025; 11(2):e42066.

PMID: 39911424 PMC: 11795063. DOI: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2025.e42066.

Investigating the Cytotoxic Effects of Extract on Oral Carcinoma Cell Line.

Tsamesidis I, Papadimitriou-Tsantarliotou A, Christodoulou A, Amanatidou D, Avgeros C, Stalika E Biomedicines. 2025; 12(12.

PMID: 39767582 PMC: 11726897. DOI: 10.3390/biomedicines12122674.

Perturbation of hyperthermia resistance in gastric cancer by hyperstimulation of autophagy using artemisinin-protected iron-oxide nanoparticles.

Attri K, Chudasama B, Mahajan R, Choudhury D RSC Adv. 2024; 14(47):34565-34577.

PMID: 39479497 PMC: 11520311. DOI: 10.1039/d4ra05611f.

New clinical application prospects of artemisinin and its derivatives: a scoping review.

Huang Y, Yang Y, Liu G, Xu M Infect Dis Poverty. 2023; 12(1):115.

PMID: 38072951 PMC: 10712159. DOI: 10.1186/s40249-023-01152-6.

Molecular Hybridization as a Strategy for Developing Artemisinin-Derived Anticancer Candidates.

Marchesi E, Perrone D, Navacchia M Pharmaceutics. 2023; 15(9).

PMID: 37765156 PMC: 10536797. DOI: 10.3390/pharmaceutics15092185.

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