Antiproliferative properties of banana soft pith (musa paradisiaca) extracts against human colon adenocarcinoma cell line (HT-29) and hepatic foetal human epithelial cell line (WRL-68) / Sakilah Ismail

Banana soft pith (BSP) is an edible tender portion of banana stem with diameter 5-6 cm. According to traditional medicine practitioner, the banana soft pith (BSP) has many beneficial uses. As a traditional remedy, BSP is used to treat fever by lowering body temperature. Furthermore, it has been claimed to possess wound healing properties, antihyperlipidemic, antidiabetic and able to treat kidney stones but the scientific evidence in this area is still lacking. This study was conducted to investigate the cytotoxicity effect of BSP ethanolic extract against human colon adenocarcinoma cell line {HT-29) and acetone extract against hepatic fetal human epithelial cell line (WRL- 68). From the result, it was indicated that BSP ethanolic extract has cytotoxicity effect towards HT-29 in dose and time-dependent manner. The IC50 for our study was 126µg/rnl at 72 hours incubation period. For higher concentration (500 and 1000 µg/rnl), there were significant differences {p<0.05) on the percentage of viability between treated and untreated cells for the all time interval of incubation periods. Evidently, there was no cytotoxicity effect of BSP acetone extract towards WRL-68.