The In Vitro and In Vivo Anticancer Properties of Moringa oleifera

Table 1

Active compounds of extracts from different parts of the moringa plant that contribute to the anticancer activities base on in vitro and in vivo studies.

Parts of Moringa	Extraction method	Experiments	Active compounds	Citation
Leaf	Methanol, ethanol, ethyl acetate and chloroform extracts	Cytotoxicity test on U266B1 cells.	Flavonoid and alkaloid group similar to vincristine and vinblastine.	Parvathy & Umamaheshwari (2007) [41]
	Hot water, methanol and hexane extracts	Cytotoxicity test on HeLa cells	Aqueous extract has best anticancer activity.	Nair & Varalakshmi (2011) [42]
	Methanol and dichloromethane extracts	Cytotoxicity test on HepG2, Caco-2 and MCF-7 cells. Quinone reductase induction assay on Hepa-1c1c7	Dichloromethane extract has best cytotoxic and chemopreventive activity. Active compounds are; quercetin, kaempferol, glucosinolate and sulforaphane.	Charoensin (2014) [43]
	Cold water, hot water and 80% ethanol extracts	Cytotoxicity test on AML, ALL and HepG2 cells	Ethanol extract has the best cytotoxicity against AML and ALL.; Hot water extract is most cytotoxic towards HepG2 cells. Active compounds are phenolic compounds, especially glycosides.	Khalafalla et al. (2010) [44]
	Cold water extract	Cytotoxicity test on HepG2 cells.; In vivo study using hollow fibre assay on HepG2 and A549 cells	Active compounds are water soluble bioactive compounds.	Jung et al. (2015) [45]
	Successive extraction with n-hexane, chloroform, ethyl acetate and 50% methanol. Ethyl acetate extract was further separated into 15 fractions	Cytotoxicity test on HepG2 cells.; In vivo studies to determine toxicity.; In vivo study with Dalton’s lymphoma ascites (DLA) model	Fraction 1 (F1) from ethyl acetate was the most cytotoxic against HepG2. Active compounds are steroids and phenolic compounds.	Krishnamurthy et al. (2015) [46]
	Hot water extract	Cytotoxic test on KB cells.	Active compounds are polyphenols primarily quercetin and kaempferol.	Sreelatha et al (2011) [47]
	Hot water extract	Cytotoxic test on A549 cells.	Active compounds are glucosinolates, isothiocyanates, niazimicin, niaziminin quercetin, thiocarbamate, carbamates and nitrile glycosides.	Tiloke et al. (2013) [48]
	50% ethanol extract	In vivo study on Swiss albino mice to test radioprotective effects	Active compound is Vitamin C.	Rao et al. (2001) [52]
	Ethanol extract	Cytotoxic test on HCT-8, MDA-MB-231	Active compounds are D-allose and hexadecanoic acid.	Al-Asmari et al. (2015) [53]
Seed	Dried and green seeds ethanol extract partitioned into hexane, ethyl acetate, butanol, and water.	In vivo study of anti-inflammation activity. Antitumor activity tested on ability to inhibit the formation of EBV-EA induced by TPA.	Ethanol extract has best anti-inflammation and antitumor activity.	Guevara et al. (1996) [54]
	Methanol extract	Cytotoxic test on A549, Hep-2,HT-29, and IMR-32.	Active compounds are alkaloids.	Rajesh et al. (2012) [55]
	Ethanol extract whereby the active compounds were isolated with flash column chromatography and further isolated with HPLC.	Tested anticancer activity in vitro with EBV genome-carrying lymphoblastoid cells, Raji cells. Niazimicin tested on mice induced to form tumours.	The active compounds which prevent induction of EBV genome are: β-sitosterol-3-O-glucopyranoside, 4- (α-L-rhamnosyloxy) benzyl isothiocyanate and niazimicin. Niazimicin was able to delay the formation of tumours and reduce the number of tumours in the in vivo study.	Guevara et al. (1999) [56]
Bark	Ethanol extract	Cytotoxic test on HCT-8, MDA-MB-231	Active compounds are Isothiocyanate, hexadecanoic acid and eugenol	Al-Asmari et al. (2015) [53]