Quercetin has been reported to have tumor growth inhibition effect. We have examined the in vitro and in vivo effects of quercetin on the growth of ML-3 murine hepatoma cells. Our results showed that quercetin dose dependently inhibited the growth of ML-3 cells. Flow cytometric analysis showed that quercetin-treated cells were mainly arrested at G(0)-G(1) phases of the cell cycle. For the in vivo experiment, BALB/c mice were transplanted intrasplenicly with ML-3 hepatoma cells and fed with 2% quercetin in the diet. The survival of tumor-bearing mice and the size of hepatic tumor were recorded at 40 days after implantation of ML-3 cells. Significant increase in survival of tumor-bearing mice was found by quercetin treatment, all mice in the quercetin group survived to the end of the experiment while only 50% of the mice in control group survived. These results suggested that quercetin has potential for hepatoma treatment.

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