Glyasperin A from Macaranga indica Presents Promising Capacities Against NTERA-2 Cancer Stem Cells

Glyasperin A is a flavonoid that was isolated from the leaves of Macaranga indica Wight, Euphorbiaceae, a Vietnamese traditional herbal medicine. This compound has been proven to have potential anticancer properties. However, its impact on cancer stem cells has not been identified. In this work, the potential of glyasperin A is described in terms of the cytotoxicity, cell cycle arrest, and apoptosis-inducible activities against the NTERA-2 pluripotent human embryonal carcinoma cell line. The results presented that glyasperin A strongly inhibited NTERA-2 cellular proliferation with a value for the growth inhibition concentration at 50% of 2 ± 0.009 µM and in a dose-dependent manner. Due to approximately 3 times reduction of its IC 50 value, this compound seems to be more sensitive to NTERA-2 cancer stem cells than to the HEK-293A normal kidney embryonic cells (IC 50 6.40 ± 0.09 µM). In addition, the NTERA-2 cell cycle was clearly arrested at the S-phase (56.73%) compared to the untreated control (38.22%). Besides, flow cytometry analysis revealed that glyasperin A induced apoptosis in association with increasing compound concentrations. In addition, significant activation of the caspase-3 apoptotic enzyme under glyasperin A treatment was also recorded ( p < 0.001). Therefore, glyasperin A demonstrated a potential effectiveness for the treatment of cancer stem cells. Graphical Abstract