Investigation cytotoxicity and seconder metabolites of Veratum album plant

Veratrum genus as a member of Liliacea family is important due to its medicinal properties. Veratrum species known as White Hellebore have been used to treat wounds, snake bites and epilepsy in traditional medicine by Native Americans and pre-industrial societies. Steroidal alkaloids isolated from Veratrum species have become more important recently due to their inhibitory effects on Hedgehog pathway, which results in post-translational modification directed anticancer effects. In this thesis, V. album, the only member of Veratrum genus in Turkish flora, was studied phytochemically. We primarily made an attempt to isolate its steroidal alkaloids and to elucidate structures of the isolates that was followed by cytotoxicity screening towards cancer cell lines (MRC-5, LNCaP, U2-OS, HCC1937 and 293HEK cell line). Extraction, fractionation and purification studies were performed on the plant material (rhizomes and bulbs) collected from Çambaşı Plateau -Ordu in June 2013. As a result of these studies, twelve compounds were purified, and structures of seven isolates were characterized by spectral methods (resveratrol, oxyresveratrol, oxyresveratrol 3-O-β-D-glucopyranoside, oxyresveratrol 2'-O-β-D-glucopyranoside, 2-O-methyl-α-D-fructofuranose, 2-O-methyl -β-D-fructofuranose and jervine). Two of the compounds from steroidal alkaloid group, jervine together with a partly determined compound, were screened for cytotoxicity by WST method. Both compounds provided unimportant cytotoxicity results versus cancer cell lines. In this study, three compounds, namely 2-O-methyl-α-D-fructofuranose, 2-O-methyl-β-D-fructofuranose and oxyresveratrol 2'-O-β-D-glucopyranoside, are being reported for the first time from Veratrum genus.