Corn silk crude polysaccharide exerts anti-pancreatic cancer activity by blocking EGFR/PI3K/AKT/CREB signaling pathway

Pancreatic cancer is a highly lethal and malignant solid tumor. Treatments for pancreatic cancer are seriously limited for its highly drug-resistant and immunosuppressive. Hence, it is urgent to explore novel approaches for anti-pancreatic cancer therapy. In this study, we show that S1, crude polysaccharide from corn silk, may inhibit the pancreatic cancer cell proliferation in vitro and in vivo significantly. Further studies reveal that S1 can induce pancreatic cancer cell apoptosis, arrest the cell cycle in S phase and impede pancreatic cancer cell migration and invasion. Moreover, S1 may block the EGFR/PI3K/AKT/CREB signaling pathway to exert its anti-pancreatic cancer activity. However, S1 has almost no toxicity both in vitro and in vivo. These results provide evidence that S1 might be new functional food component to be developed to battle with pancreatic cancer