## 6 Pharmacological Properties of _Apium_ Plants
### Anticancer Activities of Apium Plants
The second one, by [PERSON] and coworkers, studied the effect of the 1:1 ethanol-water extract on J774.A1 ( murine monocyte/macrophage) and HEK-293 (human epithelial kidney) cell lines and gave no inhibition [27]. Lastly, the third one, by [PERSON] et al., studied the effect of the H\({}_{2}\)O:MeOH extract at only the concentration of 12.5 mg/mL on the SK-N-BE(2)-C (human bone marrow neuroblastoma) and HepG2 (human hepatoblastoma) cell lines against Trolox(r) used as an antioxidant standard [165]. Indeed, an extremely positive result was achieved by [PERSON] et al. [166] who were the first to discover that the supercritical CO\({}_{2}\) extract of the seeds also possess a very high inhibition on the growth of cultured BGC-823 cells (human gastric cancer). An untreated BGC-823 cell was used as a positive control. The mechanism of the action of this inhibition passes through a concentration- and time-dependent cellular apoptosis via a mitochondria-mediated pathway which represents a total new scenario with respect to the usual pathway as described later for other types of cancer cell lines [166]. With regards to _A. gravelens_ var. _rapaceum_, only a partial study has been done. In fact, the data in the literature report only on the anticancer activities of four compounds isolated from the dichloromethane extract of the roots of this species, whereas, no test has ever been performed on the extract obtained from the other plant organs. However, these compounds which belong to the polyacetylenes class showed only modest activity against the investigated cell lines, i.e., CEM-C7H2 (leukemia), U937 (lymphoma), RPMI (lymphoma), and HRT-18 (myeloma) as compared with the positive control, 14-hydroxyhypocretenolide-\(\alpha\)-\(\beta\)-glucopyranoside-\(4^{\prime}\),\(14^{\prime\prime}\)-hydroxyhypocretenoate. In fact, the general IC\({}_{50}\) values of these compounds ranged from 30 to above 100 \(\upmu\)M as compared with the values of the control which were between 2.59 and 19.2 \(\upmu\)M. The only exception was falcarindol which was shown to be more efficient against CEM-C7H2 having 3.50 \(\upmu\)M as an IC\({}_{50}\) value which was comparable with respect to the control (2.59 \(\upmu\)M) [167]. With regards to _A. nodiforum_ (L.[PERSON] [PERSON], [PERSON] et al. collected three different exemplars of this species and studied the anticancer activities of the methanolic extracts of their essential oil against three different cell lines, i.e., A375 (human malignant melanoma), MDA-MB 231 (human breast adenocarcinoma), and HCT116 (human colon carcinoma). In all the experiments, which were repeated three times each, the extracts proved to be effective with IC\({}_{50}\) values ranging from 3.16 to 17.72 \(\upmu\)g/mL. Cisplatin was used as a positive control and was more effective with IC\({}_{50}\) values which were between 0.48 and 2.79 \(\upmu\)g/mL. Thus, _A. nodiforum_ may represent a new possible species to be used against some types of cancer in cases that are not particularly acute [168]. _Apium_ plants have antioxidative and anti-inflammatory properties, which play a vital role in the inhibition of tumor initiation, promotion, and progression [100]. Some of the compounds in the seed of the _Apium_ plant have collaborations in the molecular mechanisms and pathways of cellular targets that are considered to have a significant effect on the treatment of human cancers with its anti-inflammatory and analgesic effects [119]. [PERSON] et al. reported on the potential activity of parsley for its anticancer property. In their study, they revealed that the flavonoid apigenin expressed strong antioxidant effects by increasing the activities of antioxidant enzymes and, as a result of this activity, decreased the oxidative damage to the tissues [159]. Moreover, there is a lack of information about peptides from plants of _Apium_. Previously, it had been shown that an antioxidative peptide was already isolated and purified from _A. gravelens_.