Studies on the biological activity of tocotrienols.

Tocotrienols were evaluated for activity against transplantable murine tumors inoculated i.p. into mouse, and the activities of two tocotrienols and alpha-tocopherols were compared. When the compounds were injected i.p., alpha- and gamma-tocotrienols were effective against sarcoma 180, Ehrlich carcinoma, and IMC carcinoma, and gamma-tocotrienol showed a slight life-prolonging effect in mice with Meth A fibrosarcoma, but the tocotrienols had no antitumor activity against P388 leukemia at doses of 5-40 mg/kg/d. On the other hand alpha-tocopherol had only a slight effect against sarcoma 180 and IMC carcinoma. The antitumor activity of gamma-tocotrienol was higher than that of alpha-tocotrienol. Tocotrienols showed growth inhibition of human and mouse tumor cells when the cells were exposed to these agents for 72 h in vitro, whereas tocopherol did not show any marked cytotoxic activity. Alpha- and gamma-tocotrienols had inhibitory effects on lipid peroxidation of murine microsomes by adriamycin.