The Effects of Turmeric on Drosophila melanogaster as a Cancer Model

Indianapolis, IN

Cancer has forced its way into many households in this world; it would be a miracle if its cure could be found at the grocery or in the spice cabinet at home. Herbs and spices have been used throughout history to treat illnesses. In particular, turmeric has been shown to possess anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer properties which stem from curcumin, its principal curcuminoid. Therefore, this experiment tested whether turmeric was able to affect cell behavior in several fruit fly cancer models. First, S2 cultured Drosophila cells were treated with turmeric to determine if it could cause toxicity at high levels; cancer treatments should not be toxic to healthy cells. Next, we tested whether turmeric treatment could alter the collective migration of border cells in the developing egg chamber; border cell migration is often used to model cancer metastasis. Interestingly, turmeric partially blocked the migration of the border cells. To insure that turmeric was not inducing apoptosis in the developing egg chamber, we performed a Western blot to monitor p53 levels in lysate from ovarian tissue of turmeric fed female flies; turmeric treatment did not significantly increase p53 levels in ovarian tissue. Finally, we tested whether turmeric treatment affected a non-metastatic overgrowth phenotype in the fly eye (produced by over-expression of the Notch ligand, Delta); turmeric did not significantly influence over-proliferating cell presence. Overall, this experiment demonstrated that turmeric could be a viable anti-metastatic cancer treatment through its ability to partially block the migration of the border cells.