Abdelsalam HM, Abdelghany AM, Ahmed WA, Diab AA, Abdellateif MS. Ferula assafoetida induced colon cancer cells differentiation through JNK/MAPK signalling pathway activation. World J Exp Med 2025; 15(4): 110757 [DOI: 10.5493/wjem.v15.i4.110757]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Mona S Abdellateif, Department of Cancer Biology, National Cancer Institute, Cairo University, 1 Fom Elkhaligue, Cairo 11796, Al Qāhirah, Egypt. mona.sayed@nci.cu.edu.eg
Research Domain of This Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Article-Type of This Article
Basic Study
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Exp Med. Dec 20, 2025; 15(4): 110757 Published online Dec 20, 2025. doi: 10.5493/wjem.v15.i4.110757
Ferula assafoetida induced colon cancer cells differentiation through JNK/MAPK signalling pathway activation
Hani M Abdelsalam, Aya M Abdelghany, Wafaa A Ahmed, Abdelaziz Abbas Diab, Mona S Abdellateif
Hani M Abdelsalam, Aya M Abdelghany, Abdelaziz Abbas Diab, Department of Zoology, Zagazig University, Zagazig 44519, Egypt
Hani M Abdelsalam, Department of Science, Rustaq College of Education, University of Technology and Applied Sciences, Rustaq 329, Oman
Wafaa A Ahmed, Department of Cancer Biology, Cairo University, Giza 11796, Egypt
Mona S Abdellateif, Department of Cancer Biology, National Cancer Institute, Cairo University, Cairo 11796, Al Qāhirah, Egypt
Mona S Abdellateif, Medical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Galala University, Suez 15888, Egypt
Author contributions: Abdelghany AM contributed to investigation and resources; Abdelsalam HM contributed to visualization; Ahmed WA contributed to conceptualization, methodology, and supervision; Diab AA contributed to project administration; Abdellateif MS contributed to methodology, formal analysis, writing - review & editing.
Institutional review board statement: Not applicable, the study does not contain clinical data.
Institutional animal care and use committee statement: Not applicable, the study does not contain animal research.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All authors declare that they have no conflict of interest to disclose.
Data sharing statement: The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Mona S Abdellateif, Department of Cancer Biology, National Cancer Institute, Cairo University, 1 Fom Elkhaligue, Cairo 11796, Al Qāhirah, Egypt. mona.sayed@nci.cu.edu.eg
Received: June 16, 2025 Revised: July 12, 2025 Accepted: November 3, 2025 Published online: December 20, 2025 Processing time: 188 Days and 9.3 Hours
Core Tip
Core Tip: Ferula assafoetida (F. assafoetida) could be considered a potential differentiating agent for colon cancer cells through increasing the alkaline phosphatase activity, as well as upregulation of JNK and MAPK gene expression. Additionally, it has important implications for cancer therapy through arresting cells in the sub-G1 phase, inducing cytotoxicity, DNA fragmentation, and apoptosis in the cancer cells compared to those treated with sodium butyrate (NaBT), and untreated control cells. Moreover, F. assafoetida has a protective impact against the cellular oxidative stress revealed by the significant increase in the total antioxidant concentration and glutathione level, while a significant decrease in the malondialdehyde levels in the Caco cells compared to cells treated with NaBT, and the untreated control cells. F. assafoetida is a useful, efficient, inexpensive, and novel therapeutic medicinal herps for colon cancer patients.
