Cytotoxicity of six South African medicinal plant extracts used in the treatment of cancer

Aqueous extracts prepared from six South African medicinal plants, with cancer-related ethnobotanical uses, were tested for their cytotoxic ability in vitro against three human cancer cell lines: DU-145 prostate cancer cells, MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7 breast cancer cells and a non-malignant breast cell line, MCF-12A. The plants studied were: Bidens pilosa, Centella asiatica, Cnicus benedictus, Dicoma capensis, Hypoxis hemerocallidea and Sutherlandia frutescens. Of these plants, only D. capensis exhibited pronounced cytotoxic effects in two of the cell lines tested: MCF-7 and MCF-12A.