Oxidative Stress and Autophagy Mediate Anti-Cancer Properties of Cannabis Derivatives in Human Oral Cancer Cells

The legalization of cannabis in 2018 in Canada has generated a heated public debate. The subject is complex, controversial, and completely opposite currents of thought clash mainly regarding its recreational use. The therapeutic efficacy of cannabis is very limited and still needs to be confirmed or refuted. However, our recent work has shown that at low doses, cannabinoids (Δ9-THC and Δ8-THC), which are the main constituents of cannabis, are beneficial against oral cancer. In this current study, we showed that a mixture of cannabinoids (CM) can induce oral toxicity in cells by damaging the DNA and activating the mechanisms of autophagy and apoptosis along with inhibiting many cancer progression pathways such as MAPKase, STATs and NF-κB pathways. These data demonstrated clearly the potential beneficial effect of CM at low concentrations for oral cancer therapy.

Cannabinoids, the active components of cannabis exert palliative effects in cancer patients by preventing nausea, vomiting and pain as well as by stimulating appetite. Recent studies indicated that cannabinoids could be helpful in treating certain rare forms of cancer and other inflammatory diseases. The objective of this study was to investigate the cytotoxic effect of a cannabinoid mixture (CM) in oral cells. Thus, normal and cancer gingival cells were treated with different concentrations of CM to evaluate their proliferation by MTT assay, cytotoxicity by using LDH assay, colony formation with crystal violet and migration by the scratch method. In addition, apoptosis, autophagy, oxidative stress, antioxidant level, DNA damage and the mitochondrial membrane potential (ΔΨm) generated by proton pumps were measured by flow cytometry. Furthermore, deactivation of the key signaling pathways involved in cancer progression such as NF-κB, ERK1/2, p38, STAT1, STAT3, STAT5 was also evaluated by this technique. These outcomes indicate that CM, at a concentration higher than 0.1 µg/mL, provokes high cytotoxicity in Ca9-22 oral cancer cells but not in GMSM-K gingival normal cells. Apoptosis, autophagy, antioxidant levels and mitochondrial stress as well as DNA damage in oral cells were increased following exposure to low concentration (1 µg/mL). In addition, major signaling pathways that are involved such as MAPKase, STATs and NF-κB pathways were inhibited by CM as well as cell migration. Our results suggest that cannabinoids could potentially have a beneficial effect on oral cancer therapy.