Evalution of cytotoxic effect of some extracts of Avicennia marina against MDA-MB 231 human breast cancer cell line

The medicinal plant of Avicennia marina has been used widely in traditional medicine for treatment of skin disease and rheumatoid in Iran. The present investigation was carried out to study the anticancer effects of different crude extracts of A. marina’s leaves against breast cancer cell line (MDA-MB 231). MDA-MB 231 and L929 healthy cells were separately cultured in RPMI-1640 medium completed with 10% fetal calf serum and penicillin / streptomycin (50 IU/ml and 50 μg/ ml respectively). Collected leaves were dried and powdered, then were soaked in five solvents with different lipophilicity. The cytotoxic effects of different concentration of crude extracts on cultured cells were measured using the MTT assay. Chromosomal DNA was extracted, isolated and resolved using agarose gel electrophoresis. Methanolic extract exerted higher anti-cancer activity on human breast cancer cells compared with other extracts. IC50 of the methanolic extract was measured at 480 μg/ml. Furthermore, the methanol extract induced a significant growth inhibition and apoptosis in a dose-dependent manner on MDA-MB 231 as human cancer cells but there was no significant effect against L929 as normal cells. Methanolic extract showed time dependent growth inhibition effect so that, after 24, 4, and 72 h treatment cell growth was inhibited by 40%, 44%, and 59%, respectively. The present results suggest that valuable cytotoxic components could be isolated from this plant by partitioning methanol crude extract. Further investigations are underway in this regard.