Anticancer potential of Hericium erinaceus extracts against particular human cancer cell lines

Cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide. Cancer resulted in 8.2 million human deaths in 2012. It is expected that annual cancer cases will rise from 14 million in 2013 to 22 million within the next two decades. Mushrooms are extensively used as nutritional supplements in many countries. Moreover, mushrooms have many medicinal properties, including anticancer activity. In this study, the anticancer activity of different polar and non-polar extracts of Hericium erinaceus were evaluated against different human cancer cell lines including human liver carcinoma (Hep G2), the human colonic epithelial carcinoma (HCT 116), the human cervical cancer cells (HeLa) and the human breast adenocarcinoma (MCF-7) using 3-(4,5- Dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay. Furthermore, as a control, the cytotoxicity effect of the different extracts were tested against isolated mouse hepatocytes. It was observed that the extracts by water and methanol from fresh and lyophilized fruiting bodies of H. erinaceus had the strongest anticancer effect. In contrast, the extracts by ether and ethyl acetate from mycelia and broth of H. erinaceus showed lower anticancer activity against the tested carcinoma cell lines. The highest anticancer activity was recorded for aqueous extract of lyophilized fruiting bodies with half maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50) values of 6.1±0.2, 5.1±0.1, 5.7±0.2 and 5.8±0.3 μg/ml against Hep G2, HCT 116, HeLa and MCF-7 cells, respectively with non-significant effect on the normal mouse hepatocytes. To summarise, polar extracts of H. erinaceus can be good sources for isolating natural anticancer compounds. I recommend further chemical studies to isolate the active principles of the extract of H. erinaceus
evaluated in the present.