Discipline: Biological Sciences
Subcategory: Cancer Research
Session: 2
Room: Marriott Balcony A
Katelyn M. Irons - Jackson State University
Co-Author(s): Cayla Harris, Carolyn Howard, and Tammi Taylor Department of Biology, Jackson State University
Cancer is a disease that caused by an uncontrolled division of abnormal cells in a part of the body. A malignant growth or tumor resulting from the division of abnormal cells. A benign tumor is a mass of cells (tumor) that lacks the ability to invade neighboring tissue or metastasize. The standard of care for cervical cancer patients is the drug cisplatin. It is a chemotherapy medication used to treat a number of cancers such as testicular cancer, ovarian cancer, cervical cancer, and breast cancer. Some of the common side effects are nausea, temporary hair loss, loss or inability to taste food, dry mouth, decreased sweating and abnormally dry skin. Our studies use herbal supplements to decrease the adverse side effects of the current standard of care for chemotherapy to cervical cancer. Vernonia Amygdalina (VA) is a perennial herb belonging to the Asteraceae family. Extracts of the plant have been used in various folk medicines as remedies against helminthic, protozoal and bacterial infections with scientific support for these claims. Vernonia Amygdalina has many common names one of which is bitter leaf. Bitterleaf occurs wild in most countries of tropical in Africa, from Guinea east to Somalia and South to North Eastern Africa and Yemen. Howard et.al, 2016, has shown that VA can decrease the inhibition of growth in breast cancer and colon cancer. Therefore the purpose of our study is to determine the effects of the herbal supplement, Vernonia Amygdalina (VA) in comparison to cisplatin on the growth of SB15, non-HPV, E16 induced cervical cancer (HELA) Cell Line which has never been used in studies with VA. We hypothesize that aqueous extract Vernonia Amygdalina will synergize or cause a stronger effect with Cisplatin to inhibit proliferation of SB15 cervical cancer cells.
Funder Acknowledgement(s): We did not receive any funding.
Faculty Advisor: Dr. Tammi Taylor, tammi.m.taylor@jsums.edu
Role: Everyone in my group played a critical role in the process of growing and treating the HELA cells, My treatment involved Vernonia Amygdalina and Cisplatin. Each member in the group treated the cells with different drugs in order to see which drug would give the best results in order to move to treatment.