Bioactive compounds isolated from Solanum nigrum remarkably inhibit cancerous activity in cancer cell lines

Plants have natural compounds which possess antiproliferative potential against many cancers. In the present study, Solanum nigrum was evaluated for its anti-cancerous properties. Different compounds have been documented in literature for having significant anti-tumor and anti-cancerous activities because of the presence of biologically active compounds. Current study aimed to isolate, characterize bioactive fractions and their antiproliferative potential in human cancer cell lines. Bioactive fraction (ethyl acetate) was subjected to column chromatography for the isolation and purification of compounds responsible for cytotoxic effect followed by thin layer chromatography. NMR was performed for the identification and characterization of bioactive (SN2 and SN3) compounds. The docking analysis was performed to study the interactions of isolated compounds as a ligand with three receptors with specifically allocated PDB IDs 3NUB, 1JUH and 1F16 respectively. Two compounds (SN2 and SN3) were purified through chromatography and evaluated for antiproliferative activity. Both SN2 (Quercetin) and SN3 (Chlorogenic acid) have demonstrated anticancer activity against HepG2 cell with IC50 value of 13.15 μg/ml and 23.63 μg/ml respectively and against HeLa cell with IC50 value of 12.95 μg/ml and 25.50 μg/ml respectively. The results demonstrated that pure compounds isolated from S. nigrum plant exhibited anticancer activity in liver and cervical cancer cell lines along with non-toxic effect on normal cells. [Display omitted] •Bioactive compounds i.e. chlorogenic acid and Quercetin were isolated, characterized from S. nigrum.•Chlorogenic acid and Quercetin show promising cytotoxicity in human cancer cell lines.•In silico studies displayed strong binding affinity of bioactive compounds to cancer receptors.