الفهرس 
Review of LiteratureOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
In recent years, natural products are becoming an important research area for drug discovery. Many active phytochemicals are in human clinical trials. Phytochemicals and dietary compounds have been used for the treatment of cancer due to their safety, low toxicity and general availability.
Sesamol is a nutritional phenolic compound found in sesame seeds and sesame oil. Sesamol has many biological effects such as anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, radio-protective effects against DNA damage, inhibition of atherosclerosis progression in addition to anticancer effects through different mechanisms.
The present study aimed to investigate the effect of sesamol on head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) cell line (HEp-2 cell line), evaluate the cytological changes that might occur in sesamol treated cells in comparison to untreated control cells, analyse the nuclear morphometric changes of sesamol treated cells and investigate the occurrence of DNA fragmentation with different sesamol concentrations at different durations.
The study utilized MTT assay to identify the effect of sesamol on the viability of HEp-2 cells using different sesamol concentrations (0.39, 1.56, 6.25, 25 and 100 uM) over different durations (24 and 48 hours). The IC50 of sesamol was then calculated and sesamol concentrations less and higher than IC50 were used.
The study also depended on cytological evaluation to identify the presence of morphological hallmarks of apoptosis in sesamol treated cells.
In addition to qualitative assessment of apoptosis by morphological evaluation, nuclear morphometry was used as a quantitative measure of apoptosis by calculating the nuclear area factor (NAF) using image analysis software to identify the optimum sesamol concentration that was able to induce maximum apoptotic effect.
DNA fragmentation assay by gel electrophoresis was used as a biochemical assay to clarify whether the loss of viability was due to apoptosis which is able to produce DNA laddering or due to necrosis which is not able to produce any laddering during gel electrophoresis.
The results of this study showed that sesamol has a cytotoxic effect on squamous cell carcinoma cell line in a concentration and duration dependant manner. Cytological examination revealed the presence of morphological criteria of apoptosis. The mean value of calculated NAF pointed to 100 uM after 24 hours as the optimum concentration of sesamol to induce apoptotic changes. The gel electrophoresis showed more distinct DNA laddering at the higher concentrations of sesamol. The statistical analysis showed a statistically high significant difference between mean NAF of control cells and that of HEp-2 cells treated with 100 uM of sesamol after 24 hours.
The study concluded that sesamol has a cytotoxic effect on HNSCC cell line. The estimated optimum sesamol concentration that induced maximum apoptotic changes on HNSCC cell line is 100 uM after 24 hour