Abstract
Nuxia oppositifolia
Benth
,
one of only two
Nuxia
species growing in Saudi Arabia, is used by locals, to cure variety of ailments. As part of our search for biologically-active compounds from natural source, bioassay-guided fractionation and chromatographic purification of the cytotoxic
n
-hexane and dichloromethane extracts of
Nuxia oppositifolia
aerial parts resulted in the isolation and characterization of three new labdane-type diterpene acids (1 – 3) and one new seco-triterpene, 3,4-seco olean-12-en-3,30 dioic acid (4); together with 11 known lupane, oleanane and ursane-type triterpenes (5 – 15). Their structures have been assigned on the basis of different spectroscopic techniques including 1D and 2D NMR. Moreover, most of the isolated compounds showed potent cytotoxic activities against Hela, A549 and MDA human cancer cell lines compared to doxorubicin.