Exploring the antioxidant, anticancer and antimicrobial potential of Amaranthus viridis L. collected from Fayoum depression: Phytochemical, and biological aspects

Abstract

Amaranthus viridis (AV) is an invasive weed designated for natural antioxidants. In the current endeavor, A. viridis aerial parts and soil samples were collected from six districts of Fayoum depression (FD), Egypt and were subjected to chemical and biological examination. Where, the organic extracts of the aerial parts of the six distinctive samples (AV1-AV6), were subjected to LC-HRESI-MS-assisted chemical profiling. Multivariate analysis of MS data revealed good clustering of A. viridis collected from three sites (1, 2 and 6) and empowered the hypothesis of chemical composition analogy among extracts AV1, AV2 and AV6. On the other hand, extracts AV3, AV4 and AV5 were not resemblant to each other and were apart from AV1, AV2 and AV6. Similarly, multivariate analysis of physico-chemical properties of A. viridis-associated soil samples showed good clustering of the same three sites (1, 2 and 6). The total phenolics contents (TPC) and total antioxidant capacity (TAC) were promising in all extracts, and they could be arranged in the order of AV6 ˃ AV2 ˃ AV5 ˃ AV3 ˃ AV4 ˃ AV1. Moreover, the uniqueness of AV2, AV3 and AV4 extracts lies in guttiferic acid and the high content of alkaloids that granted the privilege of cytotoxicity toward human liver cancer cell line (HepG2) and human metastatic breast cancer cell line (MDA-MB-231). Regarding the antimicrobial activity, AV1 and AV6 showed the highest antibacterial activity against S. aureus meanwhile AV2, AV3 and AV5 depicted the highest values in case of S. typhi and E. coli. Also, the study revealed that AV1, AV4, and AV6 reflects their prodigious minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) values against E. coli, S. aureus, and S. typhi. In terms of antifungal activity, AV6 extract recorded as the most inhibition performance against A. flavus and A. niger, whereas AV2 and AV5 inhibited C. albicans the least. According to biofilm activity, AV4 and AV5 were superior, remarkably against E. coli and B. subtilis respectively. Interestingly, the AV6 extract performed exceptionally well as an antibiofilm agent against P. aeruginosa. The potency of some extracts rather than others may rely on possible relationships between soil physicochemical characteristics and chemical composition of A. viridis which contributed to the observed biological properties. Such factors should be taken into consideration in assessing quality control of medicinal plants.