Closantel Suppresses Angiogenesis and Cancer Growth in Zebrafish Models

Angiogenesis has emerged as an important therapeutic target in several major diseases, including cancer and age-related macular degeneration. The zebrafish offer the potential for high-throughput drug discovery in a whole vertebrate system. In this study, we have taken advantage of the transgenic Tg (fli1a:EGFP) zebrafish line to screen the U.S. Drug Collection Library and identified 11 old drugs with antiangiogenic activity, including Closantel, an FDA-approved broad-spectrum salicylanilide antiparasitic drug for a variety of types of animals. Closantel was confirmed to have antiangiogenic activity in zebrafish with a half-inhibitory concentration (IC50) at 1.69 μM on the intersegmental vessels and 1.45 μM on the subintestinal vessels. Closantel also markedly suppressed cancer growth in zebrafish xenotransplanted with human lymphoma, cervical cancer, pancreatic cancer, and liver cancer cells, generally in a dose-dependent manner. These data reveal that Closantel has antiangiogenesis and anticancer effects and could be a potential drug candidate for animal and human cancer treatments. Further study is needed to clarify the mechanisms involved in the antiangiogenesis and anticancer effects of Closantel.