Research Article The Reproductive Toxicity Associated with Dodonaea viscosa,a Folk Medicinal Plant in Saudi Arabia Muhammad Farooq Khan , 1 Ali S. Alqahtani, 2 Omer M. Almarfadi, 2 Riaz Ullah , 2 Fahd A. Nasr , 2 Omar M. Noman , 2 Nasir A. Siddiqui, 2 Abdelaaty A. Shahat, 2 and Syed Rizwan Ahamad 3 1 Department of Zoology, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O Box 2455, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia 2 Department of Pharmacognosy (Medicinal, Aromatic and Poisonous Plants Research Center), College of Pharmacy, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2457, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia 3 Central Laboratory, College of Pharmacy, King Saud University, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia Correspondence should be addressed to Muhammad Farooq Khan; fmuhammad@ksu.edu.sa and Riaz Ullah; rullah@ksu.edu.sa Received 19 November 2020; Revised 23 December 2020; Accepted 3 January 2021; Published 15 January 2021 Academic Editor: Armando Zarrelli Copyright © 2021 Muhammad Farooq Khan et al. is is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Dodonaeaviscosa is a medicinal plant which is being used to treat various diseases in humans. e available safety data suggest that the plant does not produce any side effects, or toxicity, in tested adult experimental animals. However, the influence of D.viscosa on fetus or embryonic development is largely not known. is study was conducted in order to find out the reproductive toxicity of D. viscosa in experimental animals. Zebrafish embryos were used as the in vivo developmental toxicity animal model. Methanolic crude extract, hexane, chloroform, and butanol fractions were prepared from the leaves of D. viscosa. Zebrafish embryos were exposed to serial dilution of crude extract and other fractions. e crude extract and hexane fraction induced higher level of toxicity in zebrafish embryos as compared to chloroform and butanol fractions. e phenol and flavonoid estimation revealed that crude leaves extract and hexane fractions had lower content of phenol and flavonoid. Two major compounds, phytol and methyl ester, of hexadecanoic acid were identified by gas chromatography and mass spectrophotometry (GC-MS) analysis. More detailed studies are needed to check the toxicity of D. viscosa in pregnant experimental animals; however, the results from this study have shown that D. viscosa possesses reproductive toxicity and its use and doses must be carefully monitored in pregnant patients. 1. Introduction In recent years, there has been a renewed interest into the biological activity of traditional plant medicines, and the role of natural products in drug discovery [1–3]. Reasons for this include the great need for new molecular models, as this leads to potential new drugs, and for authenticating tra- ditional applications for use in current therapy [4]. Dodonaea viscosa is an evergreen shrub belonging to the Sapindaceae family that consists of about 150 genera and 200 species [5]. Initially, it was a native of Australia and later widespread throughout the tropical regions [6]. In Saudi Arabia, D.viscosa is widely found in the southern province, Hijaz region, and eastern region [7]. It has been accounted as one of the famous traditional remedies for wide verities of ailments like rheumatism, fractures, diarrheas, gout, hepatic or splenic pain, smooth muscles disorders (uterine pain), hemorrhoids, snake bites, and sore throat [8]. e literature review has shown that ethanol extract of D. viscosa flower exhibits cytotoxic activity against breast cancer in an invitro study [9]. Moreover, the anticancer activity of the ethanol extract through induction of apoptosis in human breast cancer cell line has been reported [10]. In addition, dodonaeasides A and B, triterpenoid saponins, were isolated from ethyl acetate extract of D. viscosa roots and showed antiproliferative property against human ovarian cancer cell Hindawi Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine Volume 2021, Article ID 6689110, 9 pages https://doi.org/10.1155/2021/6689110