Abstract

ANTIOXIDANT, ANTICANCER PROPERTIES OF OCIMUM TENUIFLORUM L., ASSOCIATED ENDOPHYTIC FUNGI

Jayabarath J.* and Godwin Jeremiah I

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Abstract

Fungal endophytes have the ability to produce various type of biologically active novel compounds which can be used to treat various diseases. The diverse bioactive compounds produced from the fungal endophytes depends upon the geographical conditions. In this study, different samples of Ocimum tenuiflorum from three different sites of Chennai and Trichy, Tamilnadu. Nine different of endophytic fungi were isolated. The isolated endophytes produced secondary metabolites on production broth. The bioactive compounds were produced for nine isolates. The antioxidant activity of the fungal endophytic metabolites was assessed by DPPH, FRAP and NO assays. The cytotoxicity of the selected three isolates against HeLa cell lines were evaluated by performing MTT assay. The three selected isolates showed cytotoxicity against HeLa cells with IC50 value at the concentration of 165.98 μg/ml, 81.11 μg/ml and 256.43 μg/ml, respectively. The third isolate which have more prominent cytotoxic activity against HeLa cells was further selected for metabolite profiling by GC-MS. Nearly 20 bioactive compounds were characterized from the chosen isolate by GC-MS. Apoptosis of HeLa cell lines by the crude extract was assessed by DNA fragmentation assay which showed better cleavage pattern. Measurement of live and dead cells assay was carried out by flow cytometry analysis. The fungal identification was carried out using ITS region genotyping showing that the fungus was closely related with Diaporthe eres.

Keywords: Fungal endophytes, DPPH assay, FRAP assay, NO assay, Cytotoxicity, MTT assay, Apoptosis, DNA fragmentation assay, GC-MS, Flow cytometry, ITS amplification.