Honokiol is a small biphenolic compound extracted from the bark, seed cones, and leaves of the Magnolia officinalis and related Magnolia species. It has been used for centuries in traditional Asian medicine for anxiety, inflammation, and gastrointestinal disorders. Over the past two decades, honokiol has attracted considerable interest in oncology because it appears to target multiple hallmarks of cancer simultaneously while exhibiting relatively low toxicity in preclinical models.
Unlike single-target drugs, honokiol affects numerous signaling pathways involved in tumor growth, metastasis, angiogenesis, cancer stem-cell survival, immune evasion, and treatment resistance.This broad activity makes it particularly attractive within a metabolic and systems-biology approach to cancer.