Anti-tumor potential and acute toxicity of Jacaranda puberula Cham. (Bignoniacea)

Cancer chemotherapy is an important strategy to treat this leading cause of death worldwide and plants may constitute a source of new antineoplastic agents. This work fractionated the ethanolic extract of Jacaranda puberula leaves and studied the in vitro antitumoral action and some toxicological effects of the most bioactive fraction. Cell lines related to worldwide cancers were used. The Dichloromethane (DCM) and PP fractions were the most bioactive ones. The anti-tumoral action of the DCM fraction was higher than that of the crude EtOH extract while that of PP fraction was higher than the original one (DCM) for both breast (MCF-7), prostate (PC3) and lung (A549) tumor cells, chronic leukemia cells. The K562 cells were the most sensitive cell line. The PP fraction (20 μg/mL) cytotoxicity for these cells was similar to that of the ursolic acid triterpene or the antineoplastic ethoposide. The PP fraction inhibited K562 cell proliferation without cell cycle arrest in a specific phase or apoptosis. PP increased the mitochondrial reduction activity of lymphocytes. After a single dose by oral route, PP fraction did not induce intrinsic acute toxicity or animal death. This work demonstrated that the J. puberula fraction (PP) present high in vitro anti-tumoral effect with no cytotoxicity for immune system cells or oral acute toxicity, improving the Jacaranda puberula ethnopharmacology and reporting new biological effects for the genus Jacaranda.