Antiproliferative activity against cancer cells of apis mellifera propolis from nan province, Thailand

Abstract

Propolis is one of honeybee products. It provides a lot of bioactivities such as antibacterial, antifungal, anti-inflammatory, anti-tumor, etc. In this research, propolis of Apis mellifera was focused. It was collected from Nan province, Thailand. Propolis was initially extracted by 96% (v/v) EtOH and water. The antiproliferative activity of crude extract was performed against 5 cancer cell lines which were human duetol carcinoma (BT474), human lung undifferentiated (Chago), human liver hepatoblastoma (Hep-G2), human gastric carcinoma (KATO-III), and human colon adenocarcinoma (SW620). Also, fibroblast cells (Hs27) were used as control. It was found that, by MTT assay, crude EtOH extract of propolis (CEE) had the good antiproliferative activity against those selected cells. Later, CEE was partitioned by hexane, CH2Cl2, and MeOH in order to separate compounds based on their polarities. Each part was tested against those selected cells. The result indicated that crude hexane extract of propolis (CHE) had the best antiproliferative activity against cancer cells. After that, CHE was further purified by various chromatographies. All obtained fractions were tested against those selected cells by MTT assay again. It was presented that fractions 3 (compound 1) and 5 (compound 2) had the good antiproliferative activity. The value of inhibition concentration at 50% (IC50) of compound 1 for SW620, Hep-G2, BT474, KATO-III, Chago, and Hs27 were 10.76, 21.52, 13.95, 10.93, 29.30, and 21.35 µg/ml, respectively. The IC50 values of compound 2 for SW620, Hep-G2, KATO-III, Chago, BT474, and Hs27 were <3.125, 5.97, 4.03, 5.78, 4.41, and 5.97 µg/ml, respectively. After being analyzed by Nuclear Magnetic Resonance and Mass Spectroscopy, it was shown that compound 1 was in a cardanol group and compound 2 was in a cardol group.