ABSTRACT
Despite the fact that cancer chemotherapy has undergone an exceptional transformation in recent years and there are many treatment regimens available, their clinical effectiveness does not always deliver the intended results, as cancer recurrence and metastasis are prevalent. In order to find novel therapeutic leads for various diseases, especially in cancer chemotherapy, it is continually necessary to find more targeted unique chemical entities with improved efficacy and fewer side effects from natural resources. Researchers studying natural products have recently become quite interested in mangroves, particularly because of the diversity of secondary metabolites that these plants produce as one of their distinctive adaptations for surviving in harsh environments. To date, a variety of mangrove plants have been studied for their anticancer potential in various experimental models, and a number of compounds have been identified, such as bisoxazolinone (Acanthus ebracteatus), xylomexicanins and gedunin (Avicennia germinans), avicequinones and stenocarpoquinone B (Avicennia marina), betulinic acid, lupeol, and betulinaldehyde (Avicennia officinalis), brugine (Bruguiera gymnorhiza and Bruguiera sexangula), quinine (Ceriops decandra), Tagalsins (Ceriops tagal), excoecarins (Excoecaria agallocha), sonnercerebroside and (+)-dehydrodiconiferyl alcohol (Sonneratia ovata), and xylomolins (Xylocarpus moluccensis). This chapter reviews the anticancer potential of mangroves and their promising bioactive principles in depth and critically.
