Abstract
Phaeangium lefebvrei belongs to desert truffles found naturally in deserts in the Arab Peninsula, and mainly consumed by birds. Therefore, they still present a natural un investigated source for the presence of bioactive molecules. In the present investigation, we evaluated the anti-proliferative activities of different solvent extracts of P. lefebvrei against MCF-7, HepG2 and L929 cancer cells. Results showed that evaluated extracts have promising anticancer effects against different tested cell lines. Moreover, Ethyl acetate extract resulted in maximal growth inhibition against L929 cells (95.7 +/- 0.02%), while both ethyl acetate and hexane extracts inhibited MCF-7 cell growth by about 92.5 +/- 0.03 and 91.7 +/- 0.04%, respectively. Furthermore, the obtained IC50 values for these extracts against MCF-7 cells recorded 103.8 +/- 0.09 and 553.6 +/- 0.1 mu g/mL, respectively. Accordingly, desert truffles represent a significant potential in the development of promising anticancer pharmaceutical drugs.