An Investigation of the Cytotoxic, Cytogenetic and Teratogenic Potentials of Catharanthusroseus

This study was designed to evaluate the cytotoxic, genotoxic effects of the aqueous extract of Catharanthus roseus leaves on the somatic and germ cells of Swiss albino mice Mus musculus BALB/c strain, in addition to examine its teratogenic effect in pregnant mice on new infants. A preliminary step to evaluate the extract toxicity was to determine the lethal dose of the leaves aqueous extract, then three sub lethal doses were chosen (0.767, 0.383, and 0.191 gm/kg of body weight) for the next experiments on the basis of the value of LD50 (7.67gm/kg) achieved in this study. The doses 0.767gm/kg and 0.383gm/kg exhibited significant mitotic arrest in a dose dependent manner, while extending treatment periods (24, 48, and 72 hr. ) did not show any significant increase in mitotic index percentage. The treatment of a single injections of the doses (0.767, 0.383, and 0.191gm/kg) for three consecutive days induced significant but weak chromosome abnormalities represented almost by the centromeric chromosome fragments at the dose 0.767gm/kg, while chromosome breaks appears with a significant difference only when there was interaction between the dose 0.383gm/kg and the period 24 hours, the extending of treatment period (48 and 72 hr. ) did not show any significant increase in the number of chromosome aberrations. Significant numbers of micronuclei were induced at the doses 0.767 gm/kg and o.383gm/kg after 24hr. of administration. The results revealed that the plant extract showed a significant induction of sperm abnormalities at the three concentrations used comparing with the untreated animals. The administration of a single injection of 0.767gm/kg of C. roseus extract to twenty pregnant females mice on the day 10 through 16 of gestation period did not show any apparent malformations. However, compared with the control population of the pups number, body length, and head length was significantly reduced within the first day of life. Overall, those finding indicate that Catharanthus roseus aqueous extract can induce significant mitotic inhibition, slight chromosome aberrations and micronuclei frequencies and it can bring about significant percentage of abnormal spermatozoa, besides its ability to cross placental barrier causing some growth retardation, rather than teratogenic effects.