In Vivo Evaluation of the Antitumor and Immunogenic Properties of Silver and Sodium Dichloroacetate Combination against Melanoma

Abstract EN

Our main focus was to evaluate the efficacy of silver and sodium dichloroacetate as dual-function agents to be used in melanoma treatment.

This strategy is designed to increase the activity of these two compounds that affect DNA integrity and the mitochondria at different levels.

Furthermore, we evaluated if the cell death mechanism induced by our treatments was immunogenic cell death.

To evaluate antitumor efficacy, we assessed tumor volume and production of tumor necrosis factor-α, nuclear factor κ B (both by ELISA), and nitric oxide levels (Nitrate/Nitrite colorimetric assay kit); for immunogenic cell death, we evaluated the release of danger-associated molecular patterns using immunohistochemistry and flow cytometry, as well as an in vivo challenge.

Our results showed that the combination of colloidal silver and sodium dichloroacetate is more effective than each treatment alone and that the antitumor mechanism is not through immunogenic cell death.

Furthermore, this study can broadly contribute to the development of dichloroacetate-loaded silver nanoparticles and to the design targeted pharmacological formulations to fight melanoma as well as other types of cancer.