Cytotoxicity of the main compound of olive oil: oleic acid

Oleic acid is the main monounsaturated fatty acid found in olive oil. Several studies have shown the effect of oleic acid on breast cancer for this reason the Mediterranean diet is based on the olive oil and specifically on oleic acid. The effect of oleic acid on the risk of cancer differs from one study to another. Several Studies has been shown the beneficial effect of oleic acid against human breast cancer it acts in different proteins activity that are in relation with breast cancer such as the AMPK protein it can also act on the receptors of human epidermal growth factors which is HER2. On the other hand other investigators have shown that oleic acid promotes the proliferation and survival of metastatic breast cancer cells by the activation of the protein Kinase C. Thus we sought to elucidate whether this compound has a cytotoxic activity or not. A line of highly invasive breast cancer cells MDA-MB-231 was used to determine the effects of oleic acid.