Talk:Cucurbitacin

broken ref link
Ref 14 ohsu.edu link is broken, but the doi link is valid. 146.198.42.181 (talk) 14:40, 26 July 2021 (UTC)

Cytotoxic = anticancer?
The article claimed that cucurbitacin is citotoxic, "which makes it an anticancer drug". Is this correct? I would think that almost any substance you find in a chemical laboratory is "citotoxic", but that does not make it "anticancer drug". Or does it? All the best, --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 04:07, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Cucurbitacins have been used for centuries to treat a multitude of diseases like hepatitis and inflammatory diseases, as well as cancer. Cucurbitacins are potential anti-cancer drugs because they tend to be highly toxic towards many different types of cancer cells, but unfortunately can also be highly toxic towards normal cells. Several cucurbitacins (dihydro cucurbitacins B and D) have been shown to have differential toxicity and are thus more toxic towards a particular cancer cell line than to a normal cell line. A likely explanation for the differential toxicity is because cucurbitacins have multi-faceted activities and have been implicated to inhibit JAK/STAT, NF-kB, and COXII. Since these pathways are often up-regulated in cancer cells, it is logical that the effect of cucurbitacins is greater on the cancerous cells than normal cells. The cucurbitacin structure is highly similar to a steroid, although it is considered non-steroidal, and thus a factor in its multi-faceted activities. Many of the cucurbitacin targets have yet to be discovered. Although, many compounds in a chemical laboratory may be toxic, these compounds are unlikely candidates to use for cancer treatment because of their non-specific toxicity. In fact many compounds in a chemical laboratory are likely candidates to cause cancer, for instance many of the halogenated solvents can cause cancer. Because cucurbitacins have specific targets, they are good candidates for cancer treatment. Lipizzaner horse (talk) 04:34, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Features of cucurbitacin E
The article stated that "cucurbitacin E contains all of these features, thus is a very potent cytotoxic". The "thus" seems to imply that c.E contains only the citotoxicty-enhancing features, not the reducing ones. Is that so? If so the wording must be fixed. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 04:20, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Additionally, the cytotoxicity of cucurbitacin E depends on which cell line it is used on, therefore the reported IC50 is inaccurate. The article makes it sound like cucurbitacin E is the most cytotocic cucurbitacin, which is not true. The toxicity is dependant on the cell line it is used against, although from my experience in general the iso cucurbitacins are more toxic than cucurbitacin E. Lipizzaner horse (talk) 04:53, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Cucu[r]bita-5-ene
The caption for the first image says "Cucubita-5-ene ..." Shouldn't this be "Cucurbita-5-ene"? —&#91;  Alan M 1  (talk) &#93;— 13:18, 2 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Cucurbit-5-ene. With "r", without "a"... --FK1954 (talk) 18:07, 17 October 2017 (UTC)

Toxicity
What should be much more emphasized is, that these compounds are highly toxic! --FK1954 (talk) 18:10, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Agree, as many of the reviews cited discuss this. Added a subhead on toxicity with additional content. --Zefr (talk) 23:22, 17 October 2017 (UTC)