Inhibitory Effects of Sodium Butyrate on Cell Proliferation and Invasiveness of Glioblastoma Cells

Abstract

Sodium butyrate (NaBu) has been shown to arrest the cell-cycle in the G1 phase and cellular differentiation in many cell lines. However, the molecular mechanisms of this remain to be clarified. In this communication, the effects of NaBu on cell proliferation and invasiveness in extracellular matrix proteins, such as fibronectin and laminin, were examined using cultured human glioma cell lines. The changes of cell-cycle regulatory proteins induced by the addition of NaBu were studied. In addition, morphological changes including actin organization by NaBu were also studied. This study shows that 1) NaBu reduced cell proliferation and invasiveness, 2) NaBu increased the expression of p21 (WAF1), 3) the increased expression of p21 (WAF1) may be independent of the p53 gene status, and 4) actin-stress fibers are increased by NaBu and these changes in F-actin distribution may correlate to reduced invasiveness of human glioma cells. These results suggest that NaBu is a promising candidate compound for treating patients with malignant gliomas.