Inhibition by evodiamine of hepatocyte growth factor-induced invasion and migration of tumor cells

Tumor cell motility plays a crucial role in the establishment of tumor metastasis and is affected by a variety of host-derived factors during the event. Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) is one of these factors and stimulates tumor cell migration remarkably. We previously reported that evodiamine has a marked inhibitory activity on tumor cell invasion and migration in vitro. In this study, the effects of evodiamine on HGF-induced invasion and migration of tumor cell lines, colon 26-L5 carcinoma, B16-F10 melanoma and Lewis lung carcinoma (LLC) were examined. HGF promoted invasive activity of tumor cell lines with maximal induction of 1.8 times at 30 ng/ml for colon 26-L5 and LLC cells, and 2.0 times at 10 ng/ml for B16-F10 cells. Evodiamine inhibited the HGF-stimulated tumor cell invasion and migration in a concentration-dependent manner, and achieved complete suppression at 30 muM in all of the cell lines tested. When tumor cells were seeded on fibronectin-coated plates with evodiamine, their spreading on the plate was obviously inhibited, while their adhesiveness to fibronectin was unaffected. Evodiamine showed a marginal effect on tumor cell growth in a 24-h incubation, although it exhibited a marked inhibition in an over 48-h incubation. These results suggest that evodiamine suppressed HGF-stimulated invasion and migration of tumor cells partly through inhibition of cell spreading.