CHENNAI: The researchers at University of Madras have found seagrass in the Mandapam coastal region of Rameswaram has anti-cancer properties and can help in the treatment of lung cancer. The research finding that Halodule Uninervis, a species of seagrass found in abundance in the Gulf of Mannar, has anti-cancer properties has been published in the International Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Drug Research.
The study was carried out by the department of Biotechnology of the university and the department of Plant Biology and Plant Biotechnology of Presidency College based on the literature available about the usage of seagrasses for a variety of therapeutic purposes in traditional medicines.
“As much as 60% of the drugs used for cancer treatment are derived from natural products. Marine-derived natural products have been reported with various pharmacological properties including anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-viral, analgesia, anticoagulant, anti-malarial and act against a variety of cancer cells,” said a professor at the Biotechnology department of the university and one of the researchers, S Elumalai.
“Our study has found out that seagrass - Halodule Uninervis - contains a wide variety of secondary metabolites that has strong anticancer properties that can act against the lung carcinoma (A549) cell line. Further, purification of the specific active phytoconstituents and preclinical studies need to be conducted to check whether the finding could help in the discovery of novel anticancer drugs to treat lung cancer with reduced side effects,” the article said.
The ethyl acetate fraction of Halodule uninervis seagrass was put through qualitative phytochemical screening, quantitative phytochemical analysis and in-vitro anti-cancer activity and various other chemical processes to ascertain its effectiveness against the human cancer cell lines including malignant melanoma (A375), lung car (A549), cervix carcinoma (HeLa) and colorectal carcinoma(HT29).
Human cancer cell lines of the four were obtained from National Center for Cell Science, Pune and when they were treated with the seagrass species, the lung cancer cell line showed a significant decrease in cell viability, said the researchers.