摘要:Common small fruit produced naturally in Japan is attracted as healthy food. We studied on inhibitory activity of several small fruit extracts on growth of cancer cells to look for a candidate of healthy food or low toxic anti-cancer drugs. Among the fruit extracts examined, Actinidia polygama (Matatabi) extract had dose-dependent potent inhibitory activity against the growth of a promyelocytic leukemia cell line, HL-60, but was less effective on a colon cancer cell line, LS-174T, or normal human dermal fibroblast cells. We examined a part of the responsible mechanism of growth inhibition of HL-60 cells. Active agents in A. polygama fruit were heat-stable and small molecular weight of less than 1000. HL-60 cells incubated with an extract of A. polygama fruit induced apoptosis, which was detected by electrophoretic DNA fragmentation, morphological chromatin condensation and the TUNEL method with flow cytometry.