Honeybee venom rapidly destroys aggressive breast cancer cells. Using the venom from 312 honeybees and bumblebees in Perth Western Australia, Ireland and England, Dr. Ciara Duffy from the Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research and The University of Western Australia, tested the effect of the venom on the clinical subtypes of breast cancer, including triple-negative breast cancer, which has limited treatment options.
“We tested a very small, positively charged peptide in honeybee venom called melittin, which we could reproduce synthetically, and found that the synthetic product mirrored the majority of the anti-cancer effects of honeybee venom. We found both honeybee venom and melittin significantly, selectively and rapidly reduced the viability of triple-negative breast cancer and HER2-enriched breast cancer cells. The venom was extremely potent,” Dr. Duffy said.
Dr. Duffy also tested to see if melittin could be used with existing chemotherapy drugs as it forms pores, or holes, in breast cancer cell membranes, potentially enabling the entry of other treatments into the cancer cell to enhance cell death. “We found that melittin can be used with small molecules or chemotherapies, such as docetaxel, to treat highly aggressive types of breast cancer. The combination of melittin and docetaxel was extremely efficient in reducing tumor growth in mice.“ Dr. Duffy’s research was conducted as part of her PhD undertaken at Perth’s Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research at the Cancer Epigenetics laboratory overseen by A/Prof. Pilar Blancafort. “I began with collecting Perth honeybee venom. Perth bees are some of the healthiest in the world.
One of the first reports of the effects of bee venom was published in Nature in 1950, where the venom reduced the growth of tumors in plants. However, Dr. Duffy said it was only in the past two decades that interest grew substantially into the effects of honeybee venom on different cancers. In the future, studies will be required to formally assess the optimum method of delivery of melittin, as well as toxicities and maximum tolerated doses.
Source: news-medical.net