Constituintes Químicos e Atividades Biológicas de Cnidoscolus phyllacanthus

Abstract

Cnidoscolus phyllacanthus (Euphorbiaceae), popularly known as favela, is usually a common thorny plant in the savanna. It is used as food for animals and can cause poisoning after eating the fresh plant. This paper describes the phytochemical study species belonging to the family Euphorbiaceae, seeking the isolation and structural elucidation of organic compounds. Chemical studies conducted with the hexane and ethanolic extract from the stem bark of the species allowed the isolation and characterization of four components: the misture of steroid sitosterol and stigmasterol, the triterpene Lupeol, ester triterpene lupeol nonanoate, a mixture of triterpenes which were identified as lupeol cinnamate with lupeol dihydrocinamate and two benzocycloheptene tricyclic compounds, the bis-nor-diterpenes deoxofaveline and methyl-éterfaveline. The structural assignment of the compounds was performed by spectroscopic techniques such as infrared (IR), mass spectrometry (MS) and hydrogen nuclear magnetic resonance (1H NMR) and carbon -13 (13C- NMR) techniques including two dimensional (COSY, HSQC and HMBC and comparison with data reported in the literature. It also analyzes the compositions of fixed oil from the stem bark. Extracts and fractions were tested for scavening radical using DPPH (1,1-diphenyl-2-picril-hydrazil) method and showed weak or no activity. The compounds were tested for their cytotoxic activity against the cell lines HL60 (humab pro-myelocytic leukemia), NCI-H292 (human lung carcinoma) and MCF-7 (human breast adenocarcinoma). Dexofaveline compound was the most active among all, with IC50 values ranging from 2.7 to 8.9 g/mL.