Abstract:

Anthocyanins are a class of water soluble flavonoids and show some pharmacological activities such as
hepatoprotective activity and anti-tumor activity. The potential anti-tumor mechanism mainly include anti-mutagenesis,
antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, induction of differentiation, inhibiting proliferation by modulating signal transduction
pathways, inducing cell cycle arrest and stimulating apoptosis of tumor cells, inducing autophagy, anti-invasion and
metastasis, reversing drug resistance of tumor cells as well as increasing sensitivity to chemotherapy. In this review, the
latest progresses on the anti-tumor activities of anthocyanins and the underlying molecular mechanisms are summarized.

Key words: anthocyanins, anti-tumor, signal transduction, molecular target