Toluquinol, a marine fungus metabolite, inhibits some of the hallmarks of Cancer

Abstract

Ten general hallmarks of cancer have been proposed so far: sustaining proliferative signaling, evading growth suppressors, resisting apoptosis, enabling replicative immortality, inducing angiogenesis, activating invasion and metastasis, genome instability and mutation, tumor promoting inflammation, avoiding immune destruction and deregulating cellular energetic. Targeting the mentioned "hallmarks" in a tumor can block cancer's ability to grow and metastasize. Thus, the better understanding of cancer biology has allowed the development of targeted therapies and numerous patients have been benefited so far. The best strategy would be the use of drugs or drug combinations that can target multiple hallmarks at the same time. The chemical and biological diversity of the marine environment is being exploited aiming to discover new anticancer drugs. Toluquinol is an example of a marine compound with antitumor properties. Isolated from the marine fungus Penicillium sp. Hl-85-ALS5-R004, this compound inhibits the proliferation of actively growing tumor cells, blocks angiogenesis in vitro and in vivo, and induces apoptosis in tumor and endothelial cells. Taken together, these data indicate that toluquinol inhibits several hallmarks of cancer, essential for tumor progression and invasion, underscoring its potential pharmacological utility for new cancer therapies.