Antimitotic Activity and Cytotoxicity Assessment of Barley Grass Food Supplement

Monaimah A. Hadji Zaman, Annabella G. Villarino, Husna A. Dimapalao, Nazma D. Eza

Abstract


Cancer is one dreaded disease caused by carcinogens that generates free radicals which will ultimately cause damage to DNA (Waris & Hassan, 2006). Food supplements rich in antioxidants stop free radicals formation, thus a major defense against carcinogenesis (Kabel, 2014). Herb-All Barley Powder is said to be anti-cancer because of chemical constitution like chlorophyll and other detoxifying agents (Lahouar et al., 2015). Hence, in this study, possible antimitotic activity in actively dividing onion root tip cells and lethal effect in animal test system of three different concentrations of Herb-All Barley powder food supplement was determined using Allium cepa and brine shrimp lethality tests respectively.  One thousand cells per replicate were scored to calculate for the mitotic index, the percentage of cells at metaphase, percentage of cells with C-mitosis and percentage of cells with other mitotic anomalies. Results showed a statistically significant reduction in mitotic index with a subsequent increase in the frequency of cells with C-mitosis in all the Herb-All-Barley treated onions.  However, the frequency of cells at metaphase did not increase significantly and so with the other mitotic anomalies. Furthermore, brine lethality assay has estimated the LC50 at 448.42 ppm. The tests suggest that Barley grass supplement contains cytotoxic agents that inhibit cell division and lethality in brine shrimps.


Keywords


Allium cepa test, brine lethality test, mitotic anomalies, LC50

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References


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