African Journal of
Pharmacy and Pharmacology

  • Abbreviation: Afr. J. Pharm. Pharmacol.
  • Language: English
  • ISSN: 1996-0816
  • DOI: 10.5897/AJPP
  • Start Year: 2007
  • Published Articles: 2296

Full Length Research Paper

Antitumor, cytotoxic and antioxidant potential of Aster thomsonii extracts

G. Bibi1, Ihsan-ul-Haq1, N. Ullah1, A. Mannan1, 2* and B. Mirza1
1Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan. 2Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Abbottabad 22060, Pakistan.
Email: [email protected]

  •  Accepted: 09 February 2011
  •  Published: 28 February 2011

Abstract

The present investigation deals with biological evaluation of Aster thomsonii. For this purpose, different biological assays of crude methanolic extract (CME) and its fractions that is n-Hexane fraction (NHF) and aqueous fraction (AQF) were carried out. The results of AQF showed maximum brine shrimp cytotoxic activity with ED50 values of 154.69 µg/ml, while the NHF showed significant potato disc antitumor activity with IC50values of 9.55 µg/ml. Evaluation of both NHF and AQF fractions for sulforhodamine B assay on human cell line HT144 showed IC50 values of 1.10 and 2.82 mg/ml, respectively. While the IC50 of CME and AQF fractions against human cell line H157 were 0.056 and 0.005 mg/ml, respectively. Antioxidant analysis of AQF determined the IC50 values of 31.98 µg/ml. DNA protection assay results of all plant extracts were also appreciating for further investigations but the extracts and their fractions did not show antibacterial activity.

 

Key words: Aster thomsonii, brine shrimp toxicity assay, antitumor assay, sulforhodamine-B assay, antioxidant assay, DNA protection assay.