Abstract

K. J. Kiran*, Rakesh Kumar Jat and J. Jaslin Edward

ABSTRACT

Several studies were reported the therapeutic potential of the plants of genus Cnidoscolus. In our previous effort, a preliminary phytochemical evaluation and in vitro evaluation of antimicrobial activity of the different extracts of C. aconitifolius was done successfully. As continuation, in the present study, the in vitro anticancer evaluation of the petroleum ether, chloroform, ethyl acetate and methanol extracts of C. aconitifolius was done by MTT assay against MCF7 and HCT116 cell lines. The methanol extract revealed a significant activity in the in vitro evaluation which was selected for the in vivo anticancer evaluation on Swiss albino mice induced with Ehrlich ascites carcinoma cells. Two doses of methanol extract, 200 and 400 mg.kg-1 fixed based on the acute toxicity study was employed for the in vivo evaluation. Standard drug, 5-fluorouracil (20 mg.kg-1) was used for the comparative evaluation. Several parameters such as changes in the body weight of the tested animals, their average life span, cancer cell count, various hematological parameters such as WBC, RBC, hemoglobin, platelet count and packed cell volume and biochemical parameters such as aspartate amino transferase (AST), alanine amino transferase (ALT), alkaline phosphatase (ALP), total cholesterol (TC) and triglyceride (TG) levels were analyzed in the in vivo evaluation. The methanol extract (400 mg.kg-1) showed significant activity in all these tested parameters comparing the standard drug, 5-fluorouracil. Results of the present study supported the anticancer property of the methanol extract of C. aconitifolius. In our previous study, the preliminary level phytochemical analysis done on these extracts revealed the presence of variety of phytochemicals including alkaloids that maybe responsible for the activity currently found. Further studies with focus on the compound level studies and toxicity analysis in the future may give more significant results which are useful for the development of novel chemotherapeutic agents.