Cytotoxicity studies of microwave assisted natural product extracts in HeLa and MCF-7 cell lines

Microwave assisted extraction of leaves and stems of seven tropical plants viz. Ficus hispida, Andrographis paniculata, Alistonia scholaris, Aporusa lindlyeyana, Melastoma malabathicum, Adenon indicum and Alternanthera dentata was carried out. Optimum extraction conditions were 600 W microwave power, 6 min extraction time (spread over two extraction cycles of 3 min each) and 10 min pre-leaching time using powdered stem and leaves samples. The two solvents employed were 90% ethanol and hexane with 10:1 (mL/g) as the solvent to material loading ratio. The residues obtained were screened for their cytotoxic activity by MTT assay in HeLa and MCF-7 cell lines. The ethanol extract of F. hispida (Moraceae) and A. scholaris (Apocyanaceae) leaves exhibited excellent cytotoxic activity with an IC50 value of 8.47μg/mL in HeLa and 10.23 μg/mL in MCF-7 cell lines, respectively. The alcoholic leaf extract of A. sholaris showed IC50 values of 20.62 μg/mL and 18.50 μg/mL in HeLa and MCF-7 cells respectively.