EVALUATION OF THE COMBINED EFFECTS OF PIPERINE AND 5-FLUOROURACIL ON MG-63 OSTEOSARCOMA CELL LINES AN IN – VITRO STUDY

Background and Aim: Osteosarcoma is a malignant cancer that effect bone and metastasising to many vital organs like lungs. There are many available drugs to treat the disease including Doxorubicin, 5-Fluorouracil (5-FU), Methotrexate (MTX), cisplatin., etc which have their own side effects and hurdles to become drugs of choice for the disease. On the other hand introduction of herbal drugs as chemotherapeutic agents opened up new arena to potentiate the existing treatment by exhibiting synergy. Thus this study was designed to investigate the synergistic inhibitory potential of Piperine (PPN) and 5-FU on the MG63 osteosarcoma cell lines invitro. Materials and Methods: The cell lines were cultured on DMEM medium and investigated for cytotoxicity of the drugs using MTT assay at 570nm in UV spectroscopy. Three groups of cell lines administered with PPN, 5-FU and PPN+5-FU (1:1) in various concentrations of (7.8, 15.6, 31.2, 62.5, 125, 250, 500, and 1000 g/mL) and IC50 values were calculated based on the % cell viability graphs. Results: Results showed that the IC50 of PPN was 14.49, 5-FU was 17.76 and PPN+5-FU were 10.79 proving the significant synergistic cytotoxic effect of Piperine and 5-FU in inhibiting the proliferation of MG63 cell lines. Microscopic morphological studies indicated that the cytotoxicity induced apoptosis in the MG63 cell lines leading to bulging of cell membranes and cell organelles. Conclusion: Further research needs to be conducted in this field to elucidate the synergistic pathways in which Piperine has shown a better anti-osteosarcoma effect when combined with methotrexate