Planta Med 2007; 73 - P_330
DOI: 10.1055/s-2007-987110

Constituents of Polyalthia jucunda and their cytotoxic effect on human cancer cell lines

IO Mondranondra 1, A Suedee 1, A Kijjoa 2, M Pinto 3, N Nazareth 3, M São José Nascimento 3, W Herz 4
  • 1Department of Pharmaceutical Botany, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok 10330, Thailand
  • 2CIIMAR-Instituto de Ciências Biomédicas Abel Salazar, Universidade do Porto, 4099–003 Porto, Portugal
  • 3Centro de Estudo de Química Orgânica, Fitoquímica e Farmacologia de Universidade do Porto (CEQOFFUP), Faculdade de Farmácia, Rua Aníbal Cunha 164, 4050–047-Porto, Portugal
  • 4Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, The FloridaState University, Talahassee, Fl32306–4390, USA

During our search for bioactive constituents from Thai plants, we have investigated the constituents of Polyalthia jucunda (Piere) Finet & Gagnep, collected from the North East of Thailand. Besides 4-hydroxy-4,7-dimethyl-α-tetralone (1) and 4,5-dihydroblumenol A (2), N-trans-feruloyltyramine (3) and 24-methylenelanosta-7, 9(11)-dien-3-β, 15α-diol (4) have been isolated from its stem bark. The structure of the compounds was established by spectral analysis (1H, 13C, COSY, HSQC, HMBC and NOESY) as well as HRMS. All the isolated compounds were tested for their in vitro effect on growth of four human tumor cell lines: ER (+) MCF-7, ER (-) MDA-MB-23, SF 268 and NCI-H460), as well as of the non-tumor cell line MRC-5. Only compound 4 exhibited a dose-dependent growth inhibitory effect against both tumor and non-tumor cell lines but with less effect on the latter. Using the TUNEL assay, it was found that the inhibitory effect of compound 4 on NCI-H460 cells was probably caused by apoptosis.

Acknowledgements: This work was supported by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (Unidade de I&D 226/96), POCTI (QA III), FEDER and CIIMAR Plurianual