Bifunctional Antidiabetic-Anticancer Dual-Active Plants: New Roles, Challenges and Prospects

Abstract

Ofodire Emeka

Plants have played significant roles in the management of diseases in ancient times, and folk medicine. And, they still play large roles among natives in rural communities and in parts of Africa and Asia.

Up to 60% of drugs in use today have their origin to plants and natural products. Several of the known plants used for man- agement of various ailments in the past have reported wide ranges of pharmacological effects which include antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, antiallergic, immunomodulatory etc. effects, due to their multiple bioactive phytochemical constituents.

Some of these plants equally exert dual-effect antidiabetic-anticancer activities by affecting processes and pathways common to both diseases viz. antioxidant, anti-inflammation, anti-hyperglycemia, increase in insulin sensitivity, decrease in insulin resistance and modulation of diabetes-cancer common and related signal transduction pathways.

They equally exert direct antidiabetic and anticancer effects by inhibiting enzymes involved in glucose metabolism, and me- diating anti-tumor processes like apoptosis, antiproliferation, antimigration, antimitosis, antiangiogenesis etc. These plants have been shown to be effective either as monotherapy or in combination with conventional therapies where they exert syner- gistic properties and increased activities.

This article reviewed several plants with reported proven and potential dual-effective antidiabetic-anticancer properties , their bioactive constituents and pharmacological processes, their reported in vitro and in vivo studies, and proffer insights on their new roles, challenges and prospects.

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