The Potential of Flavonoids and Tannins from Medicinal Plants as Anticancer Agents

Abstract

The tendency of using herbs extracts or natural compounds extracted from herbs for preventing or treating different illnesses, including cancer, continues to be an alternative to drug use. Many studies of plant compounds aimed at finding substances with selective cytotoxicity on abnormal cells. Phenolic compounds, as important secondary metabolites from plants, are one of them. In this review, the recent literature data from the past five years about anticancer/antitumor effect of flavonoids and tannins extracted from medicinal plants are surveyed. The cytostatic/antitumor effects of the individual compounds extracted from plants and/or of the plants' polyphenolic extracts are considered, in order to point out the most significant constituents or plants with anticancer potential. The most important results concerning these compounds and their derivatives in cancer prevention and treatment, the importance of their chemical structure, their mechanism of action in vitro and in vivo, and some bioavailability aspects are discussed.

Keywords: Flavonoids; antitumor activity; bioavailability; cytotoxicity; medicinal plants; tannins.