Cytotoxicity, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory activity, and GC-MS analysis of Egyptian propolis.

Natural products have a great contribution to folk medicine because it is rich in various and unique compounds. Propolis is considered one of the most important natural products due to their different medical applications. In this work, the antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and cytotoxicity of propolis to cancer cell lines were investigated which was obtained from Bee Research Department, Plant Protection Research Institute and Agricultural Research Center, Egypt. The antioxidant activity was evaluated by DPPH assay. The propolis concentration of 1280 μg/ml achieved the highest value (91.42%) of the antioxidant activity in ethanolic extract of propolis. Moreover, the cytotoxicity of propolis was evaluated using MTT assay to two cell lines, A-549 and cervical carcinoma cells, with IC50 of approximately 26.4 ± 3.6 μg/ml and 117 ± 1.2 μg/ml. The propolis concentration of 1000 μg/ml achieved the highest value (71.14%) of anti-inflammatory activity in the ethanolic extract of propolis while the concentration of 7.81 μg/ml achieved the lower potential (12.93) of anti-inflammatory activity with IC50 = 68.52 μg/ml. The phytochemical components and characteristics of the ethanol extract of propolis were determined by using GC-MS analysis. Our results emphasized that the propolis has biologically active compounds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]