Background and Aim: Lung cancer is one of the most contagious cancers in all of the world. Recently, several potential oncogenes and carcinogens have been identified, including EGFR, BRAF, KRAS and ALK genes. With due attention to the high prevalence of lung cancer, its death rate, the complications of chemotherapy and the efforts to find effective and less effective drugs, this study was done to investigate the effect of a plant extract so that results are available to manufacturing centers.
Materials and Methods: In this study, the effect of Eucalyptus extract and cisplatin on the expression of KRAS gene in A549 lung cancer cell line was investigated. To determine the cell survival, MTT was used and IC50 was determined. After determining IC50, the cells were exposed to less than IC50 concentrations of the extract and drug for 48 hours. Then, the amount of β-ACTIN and KRAS genes expressions in control and extract treated and drug treated groups were determined. For this purpose, a specific primers were designed for β- ACTIN and KRAS, and Real-Time PCR was be done.
Ethical Considerations: This study with research ethics code IR.IAU.East Tehran.REC.1396.3 has been approved by research ethics committee at Islamic Azad University, Tehran- East Branch, Iran.
Findings: The results showed that the amount of IC50 of the extract and drug was 8.75 and 1.77 mg/ml, respectively. In addition, the expression of genes in control and treated cells with extract and drug was compared. The expression of the KRAS gene relative to the reference gene in the cancer cell line treated with extract and drug, for 48 hours, was significantly decreased 2.89 and 9.25, respectively (p = 0).
Conclusion: Regarding the reduction of the relative gene expression in the A549 treated group, future studies on targeted lung cancer treatment can be promising and the potential for the use of plant compounds is more evident.
