title: Induction of apoptosis in HeLa cells by chloroform fraction of seed extracts of Nigella sativa.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Cancer remains one of the most dreaded diseases causing an astonishingly high death rate, second only to cardiac arrest. The fact that conventional and newly emerging treatment procedures like chemotherapy, catalytic therapy, photodynamic therapy and radiotherapy have not succeeded in reverting the outcome of the disease to any drastic extent, has made researchers investigate alternative treatment options. The extensive repertoire of traditional medicinal knowledge systems from various parts of the world are being re-investigated for their healing properties. This study progresses in the direction of identifying component(s) from Nigella sativa with anti cancer activity. In the present study we investigated the efficacy of Organic extracts of Nigella sativa seed powder for its clonogenic inhibition and induction of apoptosis in HeLa cancer cell.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Methanolic, n-Hexane and chloroform extracts of Nigella sativa seedz effectively killed HeLa cells. The IC50 values of methanolic, n-hexane, and chloroform extracts of Nigella sativa were 2.28 microg/ml, 2.20 microg/ml and 0.41 ng/ml, respectively. All three extracts induced apoptosis in HeLa cells. Apoptosis was confirmed by DNA fragmentation, western blot and terminal transferase-mediated dUTP-digoxigenin-end labeling (TUNEL) assay.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Western Blot and TUNEL results suggested that Nigella sativa seed extracts regulated the expression of pro- and anti- apoptotic genes, indicating its possible development as a potential therapeutic agent for cervical cancer upon further investigation.
authors: Molecular Cancer Biology Lab, Department of Food Science and Nutrition, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. gowharshafi@gmail.com
authors: Gowhar
authors: G
authors: Shafi
authors: Anjana
authors: A
authors: Munshi
authors: Tarique N
authors: TN
authors: Hasan
authors: Ali A
authors: AA
authors: Alshatwi
authors: A
authors: A
authors: Jyothy
authors: David K Y
authors: DK
authors: Lei