Anticancer activity of Cyanothece sp. strain extracts from Egypt:First record

ABSTRACT

Objective: To assess the anticancer activity of eight cyanobacterial hydrophilic extracts on Ehrlich ascites carcinoma cell line. Methods: The cyanobacterial strains used in the investigation were collected from diverse habitats in Egypt. The initial cytotoxicity test of cyanobacterial hydrophilic ex-tracts was carried out by MTT assay. The in vitro anticancer activity of the four most active extracts was performed on MCF-7 cells using sulforhodamine B assay. Morpho-logical and molecular techniques were used to characterise identity of the isolate from which the most potent cytotoxic extract was obtained. Results: Extracts from four cyanobacterial strains had higher cytotoxic activities scoring 76.68%, 77.70%, 76.70%and 74.45%, respectively. A considerable anticancer effect was only detected when the concentrated extracts were used. One cyanobacterial extract gave the highest anticancer activity on human breast adenocarcinoma cell line (57.6% of in-hibition) as compared to control. The isolate was best-matched to Cyanothece sp. with sequence resemblance 98% to Cyanothece sp. strain PCC7564 and the phylogenetic analysis confirmed its close identity to the Cyanothece genus. Conclusions: This is the first study to report the anticancer effect of aqueous extracts derived from the unicellular Cyanothece sp. from Egypt and its potential as a plausible candidate for future mass biotechnological applications.