Terpenes: A hope for glioblastoma patients

The purpose of this work is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the mechanism of action of the terpenes currently studied for glioblastoma (GB) treatment and give an insight into the new research pathways that can be opened in this area in the future. The bibliographic review was carried out using the information compiled from books and electronic databases (Web of Science, PubMed, and among others) using the keywords terpene, diterpene, glioblastoma, abietane, taxane, betulin, combination. For the citations and bibliography, the reference manager employed was Refworks. Chemical structures were designed using ChemDraw 20.0. The investigation on terpenoids, structure, and characteristics, and its applicability in GB therapeutics revealed a compelling antitumor activity. Depending on the terpenoids structure, this secondary class of metabolites was able to induce cell death and suppress GB proliferation and metastasis across different GB in vitro, in vivo, and clinical models. Thus, terpenoids and derivatives have a huge potential to be used as a helpful source of new drugs to improve GB treatment.