A screening of anti-breast cancer effects and antioxidant activity of twenty medicinal plants gathered from Chaharmahal va Bakhtyari province, Iran

Context: Breast cancer is one of the most prevalent cancers that causes substantial numbers of deaths among women, worldwide. Medicinal plants can be used for discovering new anti-breast cancer drugs. Aim: To investigate the antioxidant effects of twenty Iranian herbs and their anticancer effects against breast cancer cell lines (i.e. MDA-MB231 and MCF-7) compared with a non-cancerous human cell line (HDF). Methods: In this study, the plant samples were collected from different regions of Chaharmahal va Bakhtyari province in Iran and their hydroalcoholic (ethanol: water; 70:30) extracts prepared by maceration method. Antioxidant activity was investigated by DPPH with reference to butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT). Anticancer effects were investigated by MTT colorimetric assay. Results: Most of the plants examined in this study had higher antioxidant activity than that of BHT. Satureja bachtiarica (37.27 ± 1.56 µg/mL), Plantago lanceolata (43.19 ± 4.67 µg/mL), Parietaria judaica (45.34 ± 8.08 µg/mL), Stachys inflata (53.70 ± 1.80 µg/mL), and Euphorbia szovitsii (55.78 ± 1.37 µg/mL) inhibited the DPPH free radicals in the lower concentration compared to BHT (120.48 ± 1.42 µg/mL) and other plants. MTT assay showed that the lowest IC50s values were observed for E. microsciadia and E. szovitsii among the examined plants on both breast cancer cell lines. There was no significant relationship between anticancer effects and antioxidant activity of the plants (p>0.05). Conclusions: The examined plants might be considered as valuable resources of natural compounds that may possess anti-breast cancer properties.