Lycopene Extracts from Different Tomato-Based Food Products Induce Apoptosis in Cultured Human Primary Prostate Cancer Cells and Regulate TP53, Bax and Bcl-2 Transcript Expression

Carotenoids are the main tomato components, especially lycopene. Lycopene is more bioavailable in tomato processedproducts than in raw tomatos, since formation of lycopene cis-isomers during food processing and storage may increaseits biological activity. In the current study, we evaluated the influence of lycopene extracts (5 mg / mL) from differenttomato-based food products (paste, sauce, extract and ketchup) on cell viability and apoptosis on primary humanprostate cancer cells (PCa cels) for 96h. Using MTT assay, we observed a significant decrease on primary PCa cellviability upon treatment with lycopene extracted from either 4 tomato-based food products. Flow cytometeric analysisrevealed that lycopene from tomato extract and tomato sauce promoted up to fifty-fold increase on the proportion ofapoptotic cells, when compared to the control group. Using real time PCR assay, we found that lycopene promotedan upregulation of TP53 and Bax transcript expression and also downregulation of Bcl-2 expression in PCa cells. Inconclusion, our data demostrate that cis-lycopene promoted a significant inhibition on primary PCa cell viability, aswell as an increase on their apoptotic rates, evidencing that cis-lycopene contained in tomato sauce and extract cainmainly modulate of primary human prostate cancer cell survival.