Biological properties and identification of some active ingredients in Anastatica hierochuntica and Lepidium sativum, grown in Egypt

Medicinal plants have been used as a source of therapies since ancient times in Egypt. The present study was designed to investigate and compare between the anti-oxidant, anti-bacterial, and anti-tumor activity of different extracts from Anastatica hierochuntica and Lepidium sativum belong to Brassicaceae, cultivated in Egypt. The qualitative phytochemical screening followed by DPPH (1, 1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl) assay were used to assess the anti-oxidant of the extracts, while the disk diffusion method followed by micro-broth dilution were used to determine minimum inhibitory concentration of the plant extracts against 6 bacterial strains belonging to 3 species, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, The all results show that the studied plants have various bioactive phytochemicals. Both plants were observed to be moderate antioxidant agents but L. sativum was better than A. hierochuntica. Moreover, all studied crude extracts were able to inhibit the growth of reference and clinical isolated bacteria while L. sativum was more effective. A human ovarian adenocarcinoma OV17R, cell line was used to evaluate antitumor of these extracts by Sulfo-Rhodamine B colorimetric (SRB) assay and IC50 values below 20 μg/mL were recorded for the crude extract of both tested plants. Benzoic acid, cinnamic acid, rutin and vanillin were the most abundant phenolic compounds in extracts. Rutin and benzoic acid showed the best anti-bacterial activity against all tested bacteria, also expressed moderate cytotoxic activity with IC50 28.8 and 37.2 μg/mL, respectively. The present investigation provided supportive data for the possible use of the plant extracts investigated here in treatment of various diseases.