HPLC Fingerprint Analysis with the Antioxidant and Cytotoxic Activities of Selected Lichens Combined with the Chemometric Calculations

The aim of this study was to evaluate the ability of multivariate techniques to predict antioxidant and cytotoxic activity of the selected lichens from the chromatographic data. A simple and reproducible HPLC-DAD technique has been used to obtain the chromatographic fingerprint profiles. Reversed phase high performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC) linear gradient system with methanol, water and phosphoric acid (V) (pH 2.3) as the mobile phase was used (50 min). Principal Component Analysis (PCA) has been applied to the evaluation of the phytochemical similarity between studied samples, especially between the same species collected in various places of Poland (Cetraria islandica (L.) Ach., CI, Cladina mitis Sandst., CM, Hypogymnia physodes (L.) Nyl., HP). The ability to scavenge free radicals was evaluated using 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) methods and the total phenolic content was determined by Folin-Ciocalteu (F-C) test. In the case of DPPH % of inhibition was higher for selected species (Pseudevernia furfuracea (L.) Zopf, H. physodes in comparison to the literature data. The FRAP test showed that the H. physodes extract had higher ability to scavenge free radical in comparison to Cladonia furcata (Huds.) Schrader and Evernia prunastri (L.) Ach., whereas P. furfuracea extract showed higher ability than C. islandica. The high content of phenolics in P. furfuracea and H. physodes confirms their high antioxidant activity. The cytotoxic activity of studied extracts was tested by cell culture method using the human HL-60 / MX2 acute CKL-22 (CRL-2257) promyelocytic leukemia tumor cell line. The lowest values of IC₅₀ [µg∙mL^-1] were obtained for: H. physodes (HP1)-99.4; C. digitate-122.6; H. physodes (HP)-136.5, C. subulata-142.6; C. mitis-180.2.