Cytotoxic activity of aqueous extract from Holodiscus discolor (Pursh) Maxim. leaves

Holodiscus discolor (Pursh) Maxim. (Rosaceae) is a shrub used in traditional medicine of Native Americans for the treatment of viral and skin diseases. Antifungal [1], antibacterial [2] and cytotoxic [3] activities of leaf extracts have been described. Based on these data, time (24, 72h) and dose (1–150µg/ml) dependent toxic effects of the leaf extract were investigated in vitro in human skin carcinoma cells A431. Cytotoxicity was measured by MTT assay for cell viability, and LDH leakage was used for determiniation of membrane integrity. Significant correlation in time was observed, when proliferation was inhibited in lower extract concentrations than cell lysis arose. The aqueous extract of Holodiscus discolor leaves has been analyzed for cytotoxic activity for the first time. Table 1: ED 50 and maximal effects for MTT and LDH toxicity tests. The values are mean±SE of 4 separate experiments performed in duplicates. Statistical significance was calculated by Student's t-test, when ***p