Antiangiogenic activity of lupeol from Bombax ceiba

In the search for antiangiogenic agents from medicinal plants used in Vietnam, a methanol extract of the stem barks of Bombax ceiba was found to exhibit a significant antiangiogenic activity on in vitro tube formation of human umbilical venous endothelial cells (HUVEC). Bioactivity‐guided fractionation and isolation carried out on this extract afforded lupeol as an active principle. At 50 and 30 µg/mL lupeol showed a marked inhibitory activity on HUVEC tube formation while it did not affect the growth of tumor cell lines such as SK‐MEL‐2, A549, and B16‐F10 melanoma. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.