Phytochemicalanalysis,cytotoxic,antioxidant,andantibacterial activities of lichens

© 2020 Noura Aoussar et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Background. Lichens present a complex symbiotic relationship between a filamentous fungus, photoautotrophic partner (algae or cyanobacteria), and bacterial community. The Objective of the Study. This study aimed at investigating the chemical composition and cytotoxic, antioxidant, and antimicrobial activities of acetone extracts of Moroccan Evernia prunastri (E. prunastri), Ramalina farinacea (R. farinacea), and Pseudevernia furfuracea (P. furfuracea). Materials and Methods. The phytochemical analysis was carried out by HPLC-UV. The cytotoxic effect was assessed on human prostate cancer (22RV1), human colon carcinoma (HT-29), human hepatocellular carcinoma (Hep-G2), and Hamster ovarian cancer (CHO) cells lines by WST1 assay. The antioxidant power was assessed by DPPH and FRAP assays. The antibacterial effect was obtained using the broth microdilution method. Results. The findings of phytochemical analysis showed that the lichens studied possess interesting bioactive molecules such as physodalic acid, evernic acid, and usnic acid, as well as protocetraric acid. According to the American National Cancer Institute guidelines, the WST-1 test showed that all crude extracts did not show significant cytotoxic effects against all concerous cell lines, and IC50 values ranged from 42.30 to 140.24 µg/mL. Regarding the antioxidant activity, P. furfuracea extract showed the highest free-radical-scavenging ability (IC50 = 498.40 µg/mL). The most potent antibacterial extract was recorded for P. furfuracea extract with a minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) ranging from 0.039 to 0.31 mg/mL. Conclusion. In this research work, we report that the studied lichen extracts exhibit an important biological effect, supporting that lichens represent a hopeful source of original natural products for the research of new bioactive molecules having a pharmaceutical interest

Cytotoxic activity, acute and sub-acute toxicity of root extracts of Corrigiola Telephiifolia Pourr

International audienceC. telephiifolia is an herbal plant commonly used in Moroccan folk medicine for treatment of many disorders. In the present study, we investigated cytotoxic activity by an in vitro assay system of growth inhibition against a human cancer cell line (HeLa), the results demonstrated that CH2Cl2 extract show a moderate cytotoxicity. The acute and sub-acute toxicity of the methanolic extract was evaluated. For acute toxicity, a single oral administration was performed at a dose of 2g/kg body weight (6 females, 6 males mice). The study of sub-acute toxicity was evaluated by daily oral (5 females, 5 males) with doses from 10 to 500mg/kg/day for 45 days. No mortality or signs of toxicity were observed in the acute study. Mice were analyzed for final body and organ weights, necropsy, and blood chemical and histopathological parameters. In the 40 day study in mice the extract at 10, 50mg/kg/day showed no toxicity, mortality, macroscopic or microscopic change of internal organs or tissues in comparison with the control group. The extracts of C. telephiifolia showed a cytotoxic activity with low toxicity. They are good candidates for further investigations in the fields of new anticancer drugs discovery.Top of Pag

Cytotoxic activity, acute and sub-acute toxicity of methanolic root extract of Corrigiola telephiifolia pourr

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Ethnopharmacological studies of Mesembryanthemum nodiflorum

International audienceEthnopharmacological surveys conducted in Morocco allowed us to identify many plants species, the most prescribed and used in traditional medicine to treat cancer. From these species, we chose to study Mesembryanthemum nodiflorum. We prepa-ed various extracts (alkaloid, cyclohexane, dichloromethane and methanolic) of the Mesembryanthemum nodiflorum aerial parts, the phytochemical studies revealed that the plant contains sterols, sapogenines, triterpenes, tannins and alkaloids. The chemical analysis of cyclohexane extract results in the identification of known con-stituents and the alkaloid extract has been studied by different chromatographic methods to isolate many fractions and to study their chemical composition. These investigations revealed the presence of hordenin. Cytotoxic activities were screened by an in vitro assay system of growth inhibition against two human cancer cell line, namely breast cancer cell line (MCF7) and cervix adenocarcinoma (HeLa), and the results demonstrated that all various extract of Mesembryanthmum nodiflrum did not show significant cytotoxic activity on MCF and Hela cells, at concentrations ranging from 31.25 to 1000 μg/ml. The antioxidant activity of various extracts of M. nodiflo-rum was evaluated by DPPH test and showed that all extract exhibited higher radical scavenging activity, as to standard used, Trolox. The dichlorometh-ane extract of Mesembryanthemum nodiflorum present an anti-radical activity esti-mated to 94.39 ±0.51% (p<0.001). These results suggest that the products of Mese-mbryantemum nodiflorum may provide a new therapeutic avene