A Toxicological Study on Seed Extracts of Asparagus Racemosus Linn (Ethanolic and Water) in Experimental Animals

Abstract

The study investigated the in-vivo oral acute toxicity and in-vitro cytotoxicity (Neutral red assay (NRU) by Aqueous and Ethanol extract of Asparagus racemosus Linn seed. In this in-vivo study, water extract was found to be more toxic to zebrafish. The medium lethal concentration (LD₅₀) values of water and ethanol extract were 1070.8 mg/L and 1822.4 mg/L respectively for 96 hours of exposure. The correlation coefficient of water and ethanol extract were 0.972 and 0.9829 for linear regression curves between extract concentration and death percentage. In the study also 50% to 100 % mortality was observed with 968mg/L and 2129.6 mg/L water extract, whereas only 28.57% and 57.14% mortality were observed for ethanol extract in the same concentration range. The lower concentrations, such as 90.90 mg/L, 200mg/L and 440 mg/L having no mortality, were considered safe for zebrafish.  In in vitro study (NRU assay) on the SH-SY5Y cell line, the same trend was observed where water extract was found to be more toxic to the cell line. The results indicate that 43% of cell death was caused by Ethanolic extract at 500 μg/ml concentration. Hence, the IC₅₀ value was found to be 562.1 μg/ml, whereas approximately 52% cell inhibition was recorded at only 100 μg/mL of aqueous extract. Hence, the IC₅₀ value was found to be 114.7 μg/ml for aqueous extract. Both studies showed that the ethanol extract was less toxic, hence more effective compared to the water extract.