Original Research Article

Genotoxicity studies of dry extract of Boswellia serrata

V Magesh^1*, D Raman¹  and KT Pudupalayam²

¹Deparment of Biotechnology, Dr. MGR University, N.H.4, Periar E.V.R. Road, Maduravoyal, Chennai–600095,  ²University of Madras, CAS in Botany, Guindy Campus, Chennai – 600 025, TamilNadu,  India

*Corresponding author: E-mail: mahesharavind2006@yahoo.co.in

Received: 23 June 2008                                                                         Revised accepted: 19 September 2008                

Purpose:  Boswellia serrata, a common medicinal plant, has multiple uses in traditional medicine and, in particular, for the treatment of inflammatory diseases. The plant and its extracts have been evaluated for a number of activities, namely, anti-inflammatory, analgesic, anti-arthritic and antipyretic. In this study, the plant was subjected to genotoxicity studies in order to ascertain an aspect of the safety of the drug.

Results: Dry extracts of B. serrata showed no mutagenicity up to 5 mg/plate when tested with Salmonella typhimurium TA97a, TA98, TA100, TA102 and TA1535 strains with or without metabolic activation. In addition, the extract showed significant protective effect against mutagenicity induced by mutagen in S. typhimurium TA98 and TA100 strains with or without metabolic activation. Similarly, in vitro chromosomal aberration assay did not reveal any significant alterations up to 5 mg/culture as compared to the negative control both in the presence and absence of metabolic activation (S9 mix).

Conclusion: The results of these studies indicate that B. serrata is non-mutagenic in Ames test, and is protective against the mutagenicity induced by 4-nitroquinolene-1-oxide, sodium azide and 2-aminoflourene in TA98 and TA100 strains. It was also non-clastogenic in the in vitro chromosomal aberration study.