Antimutagenic activity of extracts from argentinian northwest plants

SOBERÓN, J.R.; QUIROGA, E.N.; VATTUONE, M.A.

Tucumán (Argentina)

Congreso; XXI Annual Meeting of Tucuman Biology Society; 2004

Tucuman Biology Society (publicado en Bio Cell 29 (1))

The antimutagenic activity is related with the release of free radicals or reactive oxygen species that can generate an hereditary DNA mutation. Mutagenic processes are refered as responsable of certain pathologies such as diabetes, arteriosclerosis, cancer generation, etc. The objective of the present study is to determine the antimutagenic activity of different plant extracts on the mutation exerted by the chemical agent Terbutyl hydroperoxide (TBH) over the E. coli WP2 (IC 188) strains. This strain carries a punctual cromosomic mutation that makes it unable to synthesize Triptophan (Trp -) and depends on it aminoacid for their growing. TBH mutates this strains, making them independence of Triptophan (Trp +). The assay employs a minimal growing medium (E4) with glucose as carbon source and inorganic salts. The S9 mix provides a source of enzimes for the TBH activation. Various concentrations of the plant extracts were assayed for the determination of the AC (antimutagenic concentration 50). The plant extracts with the most important antimutagenic activity were the tinctures of T. acutifolius and P. cuneifolius. The results shows the advantage of using plants as a source of antimutagenic molecules.