Evaluation of native and exotic Brazilian plants for anticancer activity

• Published in: Journal of natural medicines 2010-04, Vol.64 (2), p.231-238
• Main Authors: dos Santos Júnior, Helvécio Martins, Oliveira, Denilson Ferreira, de Carvalho, Douglas Antônio, Pinto, Joyce Mendes Andrade, Campos, Viviane Aparecida Costa, Mourão, Ana Raquel Braga, Pessoa, Cláudia, de Moraes, Manoel Odorico, Costa-Lotufo, Letícia Veras
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Animals; Antineoplastic Agents, Phytogenic - isolation & purification; Antineoplastic Agents, Phytogenic - therapeutic use; Artemia; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Biomedicine; Brazil; Cell Line, Tumor; Complementary & Alternative Medicine; Drug Evaluation, Preclinical - methods; HL-60 Cells; Humans; Medicinal Chemistry; Melanoma, Experimental - drug therapy; Mice; Natural Resource Letter; Pharmacology/Toxicology; Pharmacy; Plant Extracts - isolation & purification; Plant Extracts - therapeutic use; Plant Sciences; Plants, Medicinal
• ISSN: 1340-3443; 1861-0293
• DOI: 10.1007/s11418-010-0390-0

Native and exotic Brazilian plants collected in the State of Minas Gerais were evaluated for their anticancer potential. Methanol extracts from leaves of 51 plant species were tested for cytotoxicity against four tumor cell lines: B16 (murine skin), HL-60 (human leukemia), MCF-7 (human breast), and HCT-8 (human colon). Plant extracts that exhibited IC 50 values less than 30 μg/ml against any tumor cell line were tested on sea urchin egg development and mouse erythrocytes. In addition, all extracts were evaluated for their general toxicity using the brine shrimp lethality assay. The most active extracts against the tumor cells were those obtained from Lantana fucata , Copaifera langsdorffii , and Momordica charantia . These three extracts inhibited sea urchin development from the first cleavage, but those from C. langsdorffii and M. charantia were very active against mouse erythrocytes. Only the L. fucata extract presented no hemolytic activity. Consequently, although the extracts of L. fucata, M. charantia , and C. langsdorffii could be useful in the development of new anticancer products, the first of these extracts is the most promising since it did not present unspecific toxicity, as suggested by negative results obtained with brine shrimp lethality and mouse erythrocytes assays.