ABSTRACT
Background: Among the secondary metabolites isolated from Allium species, steroidal saponins are more important for their cytotoxic activities on a variety of cancer cell lines. Current study has investigated the cytotoxic activity of saponin-riched butanolic fraction of Allium affine, an important edible Allium species of Iran
Objective: This study was conducted to evaluate cytotoxic activity of saponin-riched fraction of Allium affine Ledeb on breast and ovarian cancer cell lines
Methods: Bulbs of the plant were extracted respectively by hexane, chloroform, chloroformmethanol [9-1] and methanol in a stepwise method with increasing solvent polarity. The methanol extract was then partitioned between water and butanol and the final dried butanolic fraction was used for further cytotoxicity assay. MCF-7, MDA-MB231 and OVCAR-3 cell lines were tested for cytotoxic activity, using different concentrations of butanolic fraction [0.1-200 microg/ml] by MTT assay. After the incubation time [48 h], the percentage of the viable cells was determined by ELISA reader instrument in 570 nm
Results: All of the cell lines tested in this investigation exhibited a dose-dependent decrease in succinate dehydrogenase activity against the control and significant dose-dependent inhibition of the growth in all concentrations and cell lines were observed [P<0.01]. The most cytotoxic activity was observed for OVCAR-3 cell line [IC50= 7.13 +/- 0.94 microg/ml]
Conclusion: The butanolic fraction of A. affine exhibited a significant cytotoxic activity on investigated cell lines, especially OVCAR-3, which is in agreement with other studies conducted on different Allium species. According to the results, it seems that the butanolic fraction of this plant contains cytotoxic components, especially steroidal saponins, and the phytochemical study of the constituents is suggested