Dynamic proteomic overview of glioblastoma cells (A172) exposed to perillyl alcohol

Perillyl alcohol (POH) is a naturally occurring terpene and a promising chemotherapeutic agent for glioblastoma multiform; yet, little is known about its molecular effects. Here we present results of a semi-quantitative proteomic analysis of A172 cells exposed to POH for different time-periods (1′, 10′, 30′, 60′, 4 h, and 24 h). The analysis identified more than 4000 proteins; which were clustered using PatternLab for proteomics and then linked to Ras signaling, tissue homeostasis, induction of apoptosis, metallopeptidase activity, and ubiquitin-protein ligase activity. Our results make available one of the most complete protein repositories for the A172. Moreover, we detected the phosphorylation of GSK3β (Glycogen synthase kinase) and the inhibition of ERK's (extracellular signal regulated kinase) phosphorylation after 10′, which suggests a new mechanism of POH's activation for apoptosis.