Cytotoxic effects of tea on human bladder cancer cell line T24 (poster)

Ryan Barnes, Jessicca Inez Martin, Unyime Nsyeo, Mohamadi Sarkar, Nickolaos Stavropoulos, Dimitris Skalkos, Eric Gywnn.
Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA; Hatzikosta Hospital, Ioannina, Greece; University of Ioannina, Ioannina, Greece.
93d American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) meeting, San Francisco, CA, April 2002

INTRODUCTION: Anecdotal reports of bladder cancer patients, who drink herbal tea, experiencing lower rates of disease recurrence and progression, prompted this preliminary study. We compare relative cytotoxicity in T24 cell line exposed to varying concentrations of black tea (Lipton), green tea (Salada), and herbal tea (Northern Greece).
MATERIALS AND METHODS: Human bladder cancer cell line T24 cells were cultured on 96 well plates for 48 hours. The cells were then treated with varying concentrations of tea (50%, 37.5%, 25%, 12.5%, and 5%; reported as percent volume/well). At 72 hours post-treatment, cell viability was measured using an MTT assay. Results analysis was performed by standard statistical methods (significance p< 0.05).
RESULTS: All teas showed significant cytotoxicity at higher concentrations (50%, 37.5%, and 25%; p < 0.05). However, at 12.5% tea concentrations, herbal tea killed 31.2% more cells than green tea, and 31.7% more than Lipton tea (p < 0.05). At 5% tea concentrations, herbal tea killed 34.9% more cells than green tea, and 32.9% more than Lipton tea (p < 0.05). We found no statistically significant differences in cytotoxicity among the different concentrations of herbal tea.
CONCLUSION: All teas exhibited significant cytotoxicity to T24 cell line at higher concentrations, but only herbal tea showed significant cell kill at lower concentrations