Cytotoxic evaluation of Cissus rotundifolia against four cancer cell lines and its phytochemical analysis by LC-MS/MS and GC-MS

Abstract

Cissus rotundifolia has demonstrated a broad spectrum of biological activities and has been traditionally used in the treatment of several diseases. The cytotoxic effect of the Cissus rotundifolia grown in Saudia Arabia was evaluated against four human cancer cell lines; PACA2 (pancreatic), A549 (lung) line, SKOV3 (human ovarian) and HL-60 (leukemia). Both the ethanol extract and ethyl acetate fraction showed moderate activity against PACA2 with IC₅₀ values of 51.3 μg/ml and 57.9 μg/ml respectively. While the cytotoxic activity against SKOV3 was lower, with IC₅₀ values of 82.1 μg/ml and 77.9 μg/ml respectively. The ethyl acetate fraction exhibited significant activity against HL-60 cell line, with IC₅₀ value of 54.3 μg/ml. On the other hand, the n-hexane fraction showed moderate cytotoxicity against leukemia HL-60 with IC₅₀ value of 75.8 μg/ml, and lower activity against PACA2, while no activity was detected against SKOV3. Additionally, there was no detected activity of any of the tested fractions against A549 cell line. A phytochemical analysis was performed on both ethyl acetate and n-hexane fractions. The ethyl acetate fraction analysis was performed using liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) revealing the presence of 16 metabolites with flavonoids as major metabolites. While the analysis of n-hexane fraction was performed by gas liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS) revealing the presence of 26 compounds, with phytol and β-sitosterol as major compounds. The present study shows that C. rotundifolia and its fractions could contribute to pharmaceutical industries for the treatment of leukemia and pancreatic cancers.