Abstract
Background: The current study was undertaken to assess the cytotoxicity of the leaves of Libyan Juniperus phoenicea (Cupressaceae) against human cancer cell lines. Methods: The cytotoxicity of the n-hexane, dichloromethane (DCM) and methanol (MeOH) extracts of the leaves of J. phoenicea (JP), obtained from sequential Soxhlet extractions, was assessed against four human cancer cell lines: EJ138 (human bladder carcinoma), HepG2 (human liver hepatocellular carcinoma), A549 (human lung carcinoma) and MCF7 (human breast adenocarcinoma) using the MTT assay. Results: The cell line A549 was the most sensitive to the JP extracts, with the highest level of cytotoxicity with the IC50 values of 16, 13 and 100 μg/mL for the DCM, n-hexane and MeOH extracts, respectively. However, generally the most potent cytotoxic extract across the other cells tested was the n-hexane extract, followed by the DCM extract, whilst the MeOH extracts showed little or no cytotoxicity. The percentage of viability of cells decreased as the concentration of test compounds increased. The cytotoxicity of various chromatographic fractions from the extracts was also studied against the A459 cells. For the n-hexane fractions, the IC50 values were 160, 62, 90, 30, 9.5 and 40 μg/mL for fractions 1 to 5 and 7, respectively. Fractions 4 and 5 showed the greatest effect. DCM fractions 2, 3 and 4 had the IC50 values of 60, 92 and 19 μg/mL, respectively, and DCM fractions 5 to 8 were non-cytotoxic. Fractions 1 and 2 of the MeOH extract were non-cytotoxic, whereas cytotoxicity was observed for fractions 3 and 4 with IC50 values of 50 and 85 μg/mL, respectively. Conclusion: The outcome of the present study suggested that the JP leaves possess cytotoxic activities. The high level of cytotoxicity of the n-hexane and DCM extracts suggested that lipophilicity might affect the cytotoxicity of JP, where the less polar compounds had the strongest cytotoxicity.
Highlights
Juniperus phoenicea L. (Family: Cupressaceae) is a wellknown Libyan medicinal plant, which has been used in Libyan traditional medicine for centuries for the treatment of various human ailments including tumours and cancers
As a part of our continuing phytochemical and bioactivity studies on Libyan medicinal plants,[17,18,19,20,21,22] we report on the cytotoxicity of the extracts and fractions of the leaves of J. phoenicea growing in Libya against four human cancer cell lines: human bladder carcinoma cell line (EJ138), human hepatocellular carcinoma cell line (HepG2), human lung carcinoma cell line (A549) and human breast adenocarcinoma cell line (MCF7)
The extracts of J. phoenicea showed the highest level of cytotoxic activity against the human lung adenocarcinoma cell line A549 with the IC50 values of 16, 13 and 100 μg/mL, respectively, for the n-hexane, DCM and MeOH extracts (Table 1)
Summary
Juniperus phoenicea L. (Family: Cupressaceae) is a wellknown Libyan medicinal plant, which has been used in Libyan traditional medicine for centuries for the treatment of various human ailments including tumours and cancers. The essential oils from this plant exhibited moderate antibacterial and antifungal activities.[5,6,7,8,10,11,12,13] Elmhdwi et al.[14] demonstrated that the extracts from J. phoenicea had antibacterial activity against both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria including multiple-drug-resistant (MDR) strains This activity was attributed to the abundance of α-pinene and the overall chemical constituents of these extracts. Methods: The cytotoxicity of the n-hexane, dichloromethane (DCM) and methanol (MeOH) extracts of the leaves of J. phoenicea (JP), obtained from sequential Soxhlet extractions, was assessed against four human cancer cell lines: EJ138 (human bladder carcinoma), HepG2 (human liver hepatocellular carcinoma), A549 (human lung carcinoma) and MCF7 (human breast adenocarcinoma) using the MTT assay. The high level of cytotoxicity of the n-hexane and DCM extracts suggested that lipophilicity might affect the cytotoxicity of JP, where the less polar compounds had the strongest cytotoxicity
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