Abstract: ObjectiveTo investigate the effects of elemene（ELE） combined with hyperthermia（HTM） on the morphology， proliferation， cell cycle and pAkt expression of human lung adenocarcinoma A549 cells.Methods Cytomorphology of human lung adenocarcinoma A549 cells treated by ELE（40μg/ml） or HTM alone or in combination was observed by inverted optical microscope. The proliferation of human lung adenocarcinoma A549 cells treated by ELE（20, 40, 80, 160μg/ml） or HTM alone or in combination was assessed by MTT. Cell cycles of human lung adenocarcinoma A549 cells treated by ELE or HTM alone or in combination were detected by flow cytometer. The expression of pAkt treated by ELE or HTM alone or in combination was determined by Western blotting. Results Under optical microscope， the number of tumor cells in the ELE， HTM and ELE combined with HTM groups decreased obviously， and some of them became round and smaller with nucleus pyknosis， especially in the combination group. Compared with sole ELE and HTM， ELE combined with HTM group showed stronger inhibition to the proliferation of human lung adenocarcinoma A549 cells in a timedose dependent manner（P＜0.05）. The IC50 in combination group was 88， 65 and 37μg／ml at 24， 48 and 72h， lower than 103， 81 and 59μg／ml of sole ELE group. Tumor cells of （52.07±3.10）％ were arrested at the Sphase in combination group， higher than（33.40±0.87）％ in solo HTM group and（41.58±3.21）％ in ELE group（P＜0.05）. The p-Akt expression was 0.52±0.01， lower than 0.99±0.04 in HTM group and 0.69±0.03 in ELE group（P＜0.05）. Conclusion ELE combined with HTM enhances the inhibition to the proliferation of human lung adenocarcinoma A549 cells， and the mechanism may be related to the downregulatin of p-Akt.