Comparative analysis of the cytotoxicity of two weeds, Ricinus communis L. and Lantana camara L. on HeLa cell line
Srutimala Saikia, Swetha Muralidhar and Varalakshmi Kilingar Nadumane*
Department of Biotechnology, Centre for Research in Pure and Applied Sciences, JAIN (Deemed to be University), Bengaluru-560078 (India) *Email: kn.varalakshmi@jainuniversity.ac.in
ABSTRACT
Cancer is a major health challenge with all treatment modalities face low success rate in bringing down the mortality of humans. Natural plant-based products have received much attention in the search for potential anticancer drugs. Though weeds are unwanted plants, many of them have been used traditionally as medicines. Hence, the current study aims to compare the anticancer activities of two weeds, Lantana camara L. and Ricinus communis L. leaf extracts against HeLa and HepG2 cancer cell lines. The methanol extracts of the leaves were tested for cytotoxicity on HeLa and HepG2 cells by MTT assay. The crude extracts were purified by Thin Layer Chromatography and the bands separated were also checked for their cytotoxicity to select the best fraction. The results revealed the promising anticancer traits of these weeds, and among the 2 weeds, L. camara exhibited higher cytotoxicity and lower IC50 value than R. communis, on the HeLa cell line. The findings highlight the significance of weeds towards therapeutic exploitations.