Colorectal cancer is one of the leading causes of
cancer death, both in men and women. This study investigated the effects of Amorphophallus campanulatus tuber methanolic extract (ACME) on
aberrant crypt foci (ACF) formation, colonic cell proliferation,
lipid peroxidative damage and the
antioxidant status in a long term preclinical model of 1, 2-dimethylhydrazine (
DMH) induced colon
carcinogenesis in rats. Male Wistar rats were divided into six groups, viz., group I rats served as controls; group II rats treated as drug controls receiving 250 mg/ kg
body weight of ACME orally; group III rats received
DMH (20 mg/kg
body weight) subcutaneously once a week for the first 15 weeks; groups IV, V and VI rats received ACME along with
DMH during the initiation, post- initiation stages and the entire period of the study, respectively. All the rats were sacrificed at the end of 30 weeks and the intestinal and colonic tissues from different groups were subjected to biochemical and histological studies. Administration of
DMH resulted in significant (p ≤ 0.05) intestinal and colonic lipid peroxidation (MDA) and reduction of
antioxidants such as
catalase,
glutathione peroxidase,
glutathione reductase,
glutathione-S- transferase and
reduced glutathione. Whereas the supplementation of ACME significantly (p ≤ 0.05) improved the intestinal and colonic MDA and
reduced glutathione levels and the activities of
antioxidant enzymes in
DMH intoxicated rats. ACME administration also significantly suppressed the formation and multiplicity of ACF. In addition, the
DMH administered rats showed amplified expression of
PCNA in the colon and decreased expression of this proliferative marker was clearly noted with initiation, post-initiation and entire period of ACME treatment regimens. These results indicate that ACME could exert a significant chemopreventive effect on colon
carcinogenesis induced by
DMH.