Anisochilus carnosus (L.f.) wall is an annual herb belonging to the family Lamiaceae which grows on rocks. It is used traditionally for the treatment of gastric ulcers, skin infections, cough, cold, digestion and eczema. Plant was collected and extracted with petroleum ether, ethanol and water separately and all the three obtained extracts were screened for in vitro anticancer activity against human cervical carcinoma cell lines (HeLa) by using MTT and SRB assays. Cytotoxic potential showed by Petroleum ether and ethanolic extracts with an IC50 of 5.88μg/ml and 78.73μg/ml respectively when compared with Doxorubicin with IC50 of1.86μg/ml in MTT assay. and IC50 of 17.93 μg/ml and 87.24 μg/ml respectively by SRB assay. Even though the cytotoxic activity shown by both petroleum ether and ethanolic extracts the possible mechanism for its cytotoxicity is not clear. Hence mechanistic evaluation of both plant extracts is needed in future research, so that we could come out with potent and selective anticancer agents derived from plant source.
