Cytotoxicity of Curcumin against Leukemic Cell Lines via Apoptosis Activity

The aimed of this study was to evaluate curcumin as anticancer agent. The apoptogenic and Cytotoxic activity of curcumin were investigated against two human leukemic cell lines-U937 and Molt4. Cytotoxic activity was performed by using [3-[4, 5-dimethylthiazol-2yl] 2, 5 diphenyltetrazolium bromide] MTT assay. Also 4, 6-diamidino-2-phenylindole di-hydrochloride [DAPI] staining was used as a DNA-binding fluorochome for in vitro apoptosis detection. Our result showed that curcumin have cytotoxic activity to both U937, Molt4 cell lines with 9.25 and 6.59/mL IC50 for U937 and Molt4 respectively. Otherwise curcumin was found to possess apoptotic activities which were 80.02 and 55.06% for U937 and Molt4, respectively compare with 90 and 88% against U937 and Molt4 in melphalan and the process of apoptosis was characterized by several morphological changes such as nuclear fragmentation. In summary, curcumin possessed anticancer activity by inhibition cell growth and metabolic activity of the leukemic cells and showed characteristic features of apoptosis. Further biological testing on the efficacy of purified curcumin will be conducted to get better understand of the mechanism of anticancer activity. key words: Apoptosis, curcumin, cytotoxicity, DAPI stain, IC50, leukemic, MIL assay