Phenolic Profile with Biological Activities Assessment of Ethanolic and Aqueous Extracts from Ephedra alata

Ephedra alata aerial parts are often used in Tunisian traditional medicine, especially patients with cancer. The current paper highlights, for the first time, the pro-apoptotic properties of its aqueous and ethanolic extracts on leukemic, colon and pancreatic cancers. Furthermore, their anti-inflammatory and antioxidant activities were evaluated. Both extracts phenolic profile’s was assessed by HPLC analysis. A total of eight and seven compounds respectively in ethanolic and aqueous extracts, were identified as tyrosol (31.86–50.17%) followed by catechin (9.26–10.52%) and syringic (6.94–17.06%), coumaric (10.20-13.56%) and para-hydroxybenzoic (5.67–13.48%) acids as main constituents. Caffeic acid was found only in the ethanolic extract (9.56%). The β-carotene bleaching test and ferric reducing power assay were used to evaluate the antioxidant activity. Both extracts displayed antioxidant potency. The strong antioxidant abilities (i.e. IC₅₀ = 0.023 ± 0.003 mg/mL and EC₅₀ = 0.157 mg/mL for β-carotene bleaching test and ferric reducing power assay, respectively) were recorded in aqueous extract. In vitro anti-inflammatory activity was assessed by flow cytometry by following TNF-α production after lipopolysaccharide challenge of THP-1 cells. The results show that both extracts have the ability to inhibit significantly the TNF-α secretion. An effect more pronounced for the ethanolic extract. The pro-apoptotic potency of the extracts was estimated using viable and apoptotic markers assessed by flow cytometric. Here, both extracts, especially the ethanolic one, showed a noticeable stronger pro-apoptotic effect on all three tested human cancer cell lines (monocytic, colon and pancreatic carcinoma). Such promising anti-inflammatory and anticancer properties of both extracts are certainly related to their richness in tyrosol, catechin and various phenolic acids present in Ephedra alata aerial parts.