The cancer fighting affects of bee venom have been studied since the 1950's. The component of venom that has shown the most promise as a anti-cancer agent is melittin. It kills tumor cells of a variety of cancers including lukemia, renal, lung, liver, prostate, bladder, and mammary using a plethora of mechanisms. One such mechanism is the preferentiall hyperactivation of PLA2 in tumor cells, which leads to cell death. Additionally, melittin uses capase and matrix metalloproteinases to induce apoptosis in the cancer cells. It also inhibits both calmodulin, which is crucial in cell proliferation and the melatropin receptor in melanoma cells (Heinen and Gorini da Veiga, 2011). In both in vivo and in vitro studies of prostate cancer, mettlin has been shown to suppress the activation of NF-κB and cause the death of both early stage and late stage cancer cells (Park et al., 2011)

In wasp venom, the protien mastoparan has recently been recognized for its cancer fighting potential. This molecule causes cell death by creating a highly permiable mitochondrial pore. However, its shows no preference for cancer cells, and therefore, it needs to be encapsulated in a liposome that specifically targets cancer cells (Heinen and Gorini da Veiga, 2011).

This website was made as part of a project for Animal Physiology class at Davidson College.