Cytotoxicity of hydro-alcoholic extracts of Cucurbita pepo and Solanum nigrum on HepG2 and CT26 cancer cell lines

Abstract

Plants are used worldwide for the treatment of diseases, and novel drugs continue to be developed through research from plants. There are more than 20,000 species of plants used in traditional medicines, and these are all potential reservoirs for new drugs. Cucurbita pepo has been used in traditional folk medicine to treat cold and alleviate ache. Previous pharmacological tests have shown that it possesses antiviral, anti-inflammatory, and analgesic effects. Also, Solanum nigrum has been used as a diuretic and an antipyretic agent and it has also been used to cure inflammation, edema, mastitis and hepatic cancer. In this investigation, cytotoxicity of specific concentrations of hydro-alcoholic extracts of C. pepo and S. nigrum was studied on normal [Chinese hamster ovarian cells (CHO) and rat fibroblast] and cancer (HepG2 and CT26) cell lines. The cytotoxic effects and IC50 of the extracts on the selected cell lines were studied followed by colonogenic assay method. The results showed that IC50 of S. nigrum extract was significantly lower than that of the C. pepo extract on all four cell lines (P < 0.05). On the other hand, IC50 of S. nigrum extract was significantly higher than the extract of Taxus baccata and Cisplatin, herbal and chemical control positive anticancer compounds, respectively, on all four cell lines (P < 0.05). As a result, it is concluded that the extract of S. nigrum has almost similar cytotoxicity to the extract of T. baccata on cancer cells.

Review of Cucurbita pepo (Pumpkin) its Phytochemistry and Pharmacology

“…The ethanolic extract of fruits of C. pepo was observed to exhibit a significant dose-dependent inhibitory effect against HeLa cell growth [59].…”

Antihistaminic and antiallergic actions of extracts of Solanum nigrum berries: Possible role in the treatment of asthma

“…Plant extracts has molluscicidal activity against Galba truncatula (Hammami et al, 2011), in-vitro antiviral activity against Hepatitis C Virus (Javed et al, 2011) and used in the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (Rahimi et al, 2010). Plant extract has potential application for treating metastatic melanoma (Wang et al, 2010), cytotoxic effect on HepG2 and CT26 cancer cell lines (Shokrzadeh et al, 2010) and in the treatment of breast cancer (Huang et al, 2010). Fruit extract of the plant has antioxidant and antihyperlipidemic activity (Arulmozhi et al, 2010).…”

Role of Zucchini and Its Distinctive Components in the Modulation of Degenerative Processes: Genotoxicity, Antigenotoxicity, Cytotoxicity and Apoptotic Effects

“…Menéndez et al [10] remarked a significant decrease of the prostatic growth using a lipophilic extract of C. pepo seeds at doses of 400 and 200 mg/kg. Shokrzadeh et al [13] used hydroalcoholic extracts of C. pepo leaves on normal [Chinese hamster ovarian cells (CHO) and rat fibroblast] and cancer (HepG2 and CT26) cell lines with the following rank of inhibition ability: CHO < fibroblast < CT26 < HepG2 (being the lowest and the highest IC50 for HepG2: 132.6 µg/mL, and for fibroblast:293.2 µg/mL) cell lines. Other studies revealed that aerial parts of other Cucurbita species such as C. maxima also possess significant anticancer activity in Ehrlich ascites carcinoma model in mice which may be due to its cytotoxicity and antioxidant properties [4].…”

“…Shokrzadeh et al [13] reported different cytotoxic activities of the C. pepo leaf extracts on normal and cancer cell lines. Wang et al [14] observed a significant dose-dependent inhibitory effect against HeLa and HepG cell growth of the extract of C. pepo fruits.…”

“…[6][7][8][9]. It has been used in traditional folk medicine to treat colds and alleviate aches, due to its antioxidant/anti-radical, anti-carcinogenic, anti-inflammatory, antiviral, antimicrobial and analgesic activities [10][11][12][13][14].…”