Cytotoxic Potential of Ficus palmata Extracts on Lung Cancer Cell Lines (A549)

Cancer accounts for 10 million deaths globally whereas the treatments available either have several side effects or non-effective due to multi-drug resistant property of cancer cells for long term use. Therefore, it is utmost important to find safe therapeutic drugs that have cytotoxic potentials against cancer cells. Medicinal plants are believed to have lesser side effects with huge therapeutic efficacy. One such species is Ficus palmata which is known to have several medicinal properties and great antioxidant potentials. Earlier it was reported that methanolic extract of leaves (FPLM) and aqueous extract stembark (FPBA) of this plant have decent antioxidant properties. Therefore, the anticancer potentials of these plant extracts have been evaluated in addition of hydroxyl radical scavenging property. The results shown that FPBA represents higher antioxidant (IC50 value= 242.46 +/- 11.26 mu g/ml) and anticancer effects against lung cancer (A549) cell lines (IC50 value= 69.74 +/- 2.12) whereas this plant extract have lower toxicity (IC50 value= 249.61 +/- 7.31) on normal cell lines (3T3-L1) which indicate that FPBA can be a potential therapeutic option for cancer and oxidative stress. The study concluded that the stem bark aqueous extract having therapeutic properties against lung cancer. It is to be recommended that the bioactive compound responsible for its therapeutic properties need to explore against cancer cell by evaluating various other parameters such as apoptosis, cell cycle arrest, and toxic effect on cell morphology.