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Cytotoxic triterpene and sesquiterpene lactones from Elephantopus mollis and induction of apoptosis in neuroblastoma cells.

Tabopda TK, Liu J, Ngadjui BT, Luu B

Laboratoire de Chimie Organique des Substances Naturelles, LC3-UMR 7177 CNRS - Université Louis Pasteur, Centre de Neurochimie, Strasbourg, France.

Activity-guided fractionation of root and leaf extracts from Elephantopus mollis led to the isolation of a new triterpene (1) and a new sesquiterpene lactone (2) together with five known sesquiterpene lactones (3-7). The structures of compounds 1 and 2 were determined based on their spectroscopic data. The cytotoxic activity of the isolated compounds was evaluated against neuroblastoma B104 cells. The sesquiterpene lactone-type compounds 2-7 were highly cytotoxic. Among these, compound (5) was the most cytotoxic and induced apoptosis of neuroblastoma B104 cells in a dose- and time-dependent manner. No significant difference was observed for cytotoxicity of compound 5 towards all 3 cell lines tested.

Published 4 May 2007 in Planta Med, 73(4): 376-80.
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