Screening of six Ayurvedic Medicinal Plant Extracts for Antioxidant and Cytotoxic Activity

The antioxidant and cytotoxic activities of six medicinal plant crude extracts were evaluated in vitro by using different models. In DPPH scavenging method, highest scavenging of DPPH was displayed by Hemidesmus indicus with IC50 values of 190.09 μg/ml while IC50 values of the reference ascorbic acid were 18.80 μg/ml. However, in reducing power assay, the Hemidesmus indicus was found to demonstrate highest reducing power among these plants. Moreover, the Hemidesmus indicus was found to posses high amounts of phenolic content and the Acalypha indica was found to posses high amounts of flavonoid content, expressed as Gallic acid equivalents (GAE) and quercetin equivalents (QE) respectively. Importantly, the Saussurea lappa showed highest total antioxidant capacity and Hemidesmus indicus showed moderate total antioxidant capacity expressed as ascorbic acid equivalents (AAE).All the plant extracts were subjected to Brine Shrimp lethality bioassay where, Saussurea lappa was found highly toxic to brine shrimp nauplii, having LC50 of 50.11 μg/ml while the LC50 of the reference anticancer drug vincristine sulphate was 1.04 μg/ml.