Antioxidant and Cytotoxic Effects of Moltkia aurea Boiss

The water extract of M. aurea exhibited strong scavenging effect on 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazil (DPPH), nitric oxide (NO) and superoxide (SO) radicals. The free radical scavenging effect of the extract was found comparable to that of reference antioxidants, 3-t-butyl-4-hydroxyanizole (BHA) and ascorbic acid (AA, vitamin C). Cytotoxic activity of the extract was also investigated against three different cancer cell lines, Hep-2 (human larynx epidermoid carcinoma), RD (human rhabdomyosarcoma), L-20B (transgenic murine L-cells) and one non-cancerous cell line (VERO-African green monkey kidney epithelial cell) using 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2- yl)-2,5-diphenytetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay. While dose dependent cytotoxic activity was observed against cancer cell lines, no cytotoxic effect on VERO cell line was found in the tested experiments. In addition, phytochemical investigations to identify chemical content of the plant were resulted to the isolation of (+)-syringaresinol-4'-O-b-glucopyranoside (1), p-hydroxybenzaldehyde (2), quercetin-3-O-rutinoside (Rutine, 3) and isorhamnetin-3-O-rutinoside (4) on the basis of different spectroscopic techniques (UV, IR, 1D and 2D NMR, HR ESI-MS).