Tanshinone IIA (Tanshinone B) is a diterpene quinone natural product that targets the protein kinase domain of VEGF/VEGFR2. Tanshinone IIA inhibits angiogenesis and exhibits anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, and therapeutic activities against coronary heart disease.

METHODS: Human breast cancer cells MCF-7 were treated with Tanshinone IIA (0.0625-1 µg/mL) for 5 days and cell viability was measured by MTT assay.
RESULTS: Tanshinone IIA inhibited cell growth in a dose- and time-dependent manner, with an IC50 of 0.25 µg/mL and a maximum inhibition of cell growth (>80%) at 1 µg/mL. [1]
METHODS: Human breast cancer cells MCF-7 were treated with Tanshinone IIA (5-20 µM) for 12-48 h, and apoptosis was detected by Flow cytometry.
RESULTS: A concentration-dependent induction of apoptosis was observed in the presence of Tanshinone IIA. [2]

METHODS: To detect anti-tumor activity in vivo, Tanshinone IIA (30 mg/kg) was injected into BALB/c-nu nude mice bearing MCF-7 tumor xenografts five times per week for two weeks.
RESULTS: Tanshinone IIA treatment significantly reduced tumor size and weight.Tanshinone IIA treatment enhanced PARP and caspase-3 cleavage in vivo. [2]

Tanshinone IIA (Tan IIA) is dissolved in DMSO (10 mM) and stored (in dark and -20°C), and serially diluted in a RPMI 1640 medium immediately prior to experiments[1]. A549 cells are counted in logarithmic phase and 6000 cells (90 μL volume) are placed in 96-well plates. 10 μL varying concentrations of Tanshinone IIA (final concentrations 80, 60, 40, 30, 20, 15, 10, 5 and 2.5 μM) and ADM (final concentrations 8, 4, 2, 1, 0.5 and 0.25 μM) are added into drug groups, while negative control group (vehicle group) is only added 10 μL DMSO or normal saline without Tanshinone IIA or ADM. Cells are incubated for an additional 2 h with CCK-8 reagent (100 μL/mL medium) and the absorbance is read at 450 nm using a microplate reader. Cell proliferation inhibition rates are calculated according to the following formula: the proliferation inhibition ratio (%)=1-[(A1-A4)/(A2-A3)]×100, where, A1 is the OD value of drug experimental group, A2 is the OD value of blank control group, A3 is the OD value of the RPMI1640 medium without cells, and A4 is the OD value of drugs with the same concentration as A1 but without cells. The IC50 value, which represents the concentration of the drug that demonstrates 50% of cell growth inhibition, is calculated by nonlinear regression analysis using GraphPad Prism software[1].