Phyllanthus emblica L. is a widely distributed tropical medicinal plant with good therapeutic properties. In the present study, the chemical constituents isolation of the roots of P. emblica were carried out and six known compounds (1-6) were purified and their structures were determined by means of spectroscopic analysis. The known triterpenoid, secofriedelanophyllemblicine (1), was selected to check for its cytotoxic effect on a series of human tumor cells and normal cells. Secofriedelanophyllemblicine exhibited cell growth inhibition specifically on MCF-7 breast cancer cells when compared to other tested cell lines. Further flow cytometric analysis showed that secofriedelanophyllemblicine could inhibit cell proliferation and induced G2 phase arrest in the cell-cycle progression of MCF-7 cells. The gathered results suggest that secofriedelanophyllemblicine is a cell-cycle regulator in MCF-7 human breast cancer cells and might be used as a candidate chemopreventive agent for breast cancer prevention and intervention.
Keywords: MCF-7；antiproliferative; Phyllanthus emblica L.; cell-cycle arrest; secofriedelanophyllemblicine.