BCL-2 Mediated Apoptotic Pathway as Promising Target for Bio- Synthesized Silver Nanoparticles: A Review Article

Nanotechnology has made significant advances and is now widely used across various fields, including medicine. In cancer treatment, metal nanoparticles have been used to release drugs in a controlled manner. Silver nanoparticles [Ag-NPs] are commonly used in various fields, including biomedical science, to impart antibacterial, antiviral, anti- inflammatory, and anticancer properties. Among the different routes of Ag-NP synthesis, biological approaches using bacteria, fungi, and plant extracts are promising for producing these NPs. Additionally, bio-synthesized Ag-NPs can induce different apoptotic pathways in cancer cells. However, owing to the lack of literature on the relationship between apoptosis induction via the BCL-2 family and biologically synthesized Ag-NPs, we reviewed previous studies on the apoptotic activity of biosynthesized Ag-NPs via the BCL-2 pathway. According to our findings, Ag-NPs synthesized using plants, algae, fungi, yeasts, and bacteria can upregulate the expression and activity of Bax, P53, Caspases family genes as well as downregulate BCL-2 and BCLXL expression levels in various types of cancer cells, including breast, cervical, lung, prostate, skin, gastric, hepatic, ovarian, colorectal, and bone marrow neuroblastoma. The impact of further biosynthesized nanostructures should be tapped in the near future to continue advancing our understanding of nanometric materials in medicine. The present review systematically evaluates the available evidence on biosynthesized silver nanoparticles [Ag-NPs] and their ability to modulate the BCL-2-mediated apoptotic pathway in cancer, emphasizing mechanistic insights, therapeutic implications, and potential challenges for clinical translation.