Review
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Aug 21, 2016; 22(31): 7058-7068
Published online Aug 21, 2016. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v22.i31.7058
Research progress on chemopreventive effects of phytochemicals on colorectal cancer and their mechanisms
Teng-Fei Yin, Min Wang, Ying Qing, Ying-Min Lin, Dong Wu
Teng-Fei Yin, Min Wang, Ying Qing, Department of Gastroenterology, Geriatrics, Qi-Lu Hospital of Shandong University, Jinan 250012, Shandong Province, China
Min Wang, Ying-Min Lin, Department of General Medicine, Qi-Lu Hospital of Shandong University, Jinan 250012, Shandong Province, China
Dong Wu, Department of General Surgery, Qi-Lu Hospital of Shandong University, Jinan 250012, Shandong Province, China
Author contributions: Wang M designed the research; Yin TF performed the literature search and wrote the first draft of the paper; Wang M, Qing Y, Lin YM and Wu D discussed and reviewed for important intellectual content; Yin TF and Qing Y wrote the final version of the paper; and Wang M approved it.
Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 81372681; and the Key Research Development Program of Shandong Province, No. 2015GGH318014.
Conflict-of-interest statement: We declare that all the authors have no financial and personal relationships with other people or organization that can inappropriately influence our work. Additionally, there is no conflict of interests of any product, service or company to declare.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Min Wang, MD, PhD, Professor, Department of Gastroenterology, Geriatrics, Qi-Lu Hospital of Shandong University, 107 Wenhuaxi Road, Jinan 250012, Shandong Province, China. doctorminmin@163.com
Telephone: +86-531-82166601 Fax: +86-531-82166601
Received: March 27, 2016
Peer-review started: March 28, 2016
First decision: May 12, 2016
Revised: May 31, 2016
Accepted: June 15, 2016
Article in press: June 15, 2016
Published online: August 21, 2016
Abstract

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a type of cancer with high morbidity and mortality rates worldwide and has become a global health problem. The conventional radiotherapy and chemotherapy regimen for CRC not only has a low cure rate but also causes side effects. Many studies have shown that adequate intake of fruits and vegetables in the diet may have a protective effect on CRC occurrence, possibly due to the special biological protective effect of the phytochemicals in these foods. Numerous in vitro and in vivo studies have demonstrated that phytochemicals play strong antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer roles by regulating specific signaling pathways and molecular markers to inhibit the occurrence and development of CRC. This review summarizes the progress on CRC prevention using the phytochemicals sulforaphane, curcumin and resveratrol, and elaborates on the specific underlying mechanisms. Thus, we believe that phytochemicals might provide a novel therapeutic approach for CRC prevention, but future clinical studies are needed to confirm the specific preventive effect of phytochemicals on cancer.

Keywords: Phytochemicals, Sulforaphane, Curcumin, Resveratrol, Colorectal cancer, Chemopreventive effects, Molecular mechanism

Core tip: This review summarizes the in vitro and in vivo studies on the phytochemicals sulforaphane, curcumin and resveratrol, and elaborates on their chemopreventive effects on colorectal cancer as well as their underlying molecular mechanisms. We hypothesize that phytochemicals might provide a new choice for colorectal cancer prevention and have great development potential.