Ethnobotanical and antimicrobial study of some selected medicinal plants used in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) as a potential source to cure infectious diseases.
Abstract
BACKGROUND:
Present
investigation deals with antimicrobial screening of ten medicinally
important plants used by the inhabitants of district Haripur, Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) for different infectious diseases.
METHODS:
Aqueous,
n-hexane and ethanolic extracts of each plant were tested for their
antimicrobial activity against both Gram positive and Gram negative
strains of bacteria, as well as strain of yeast. Agar well diffusion and
broth dilution methods were used to determine the antimicrobial
activity of different plant extracts.
RESULTS:
The
results indicated that all plants exhibited antimicrobial activity
against one or more test pathogens. Interestingly, extracts of three
plants showed strong and broad spectrum activity as compared to rest of
the extracts which demonstrated the moderate activity. On the whole
ethanolic extracts exhibited maximum antimicrobial effect than their
corresponding aqueous and n-hexane extracts, when compared with standard
antibiotics i.e., Streptomycin and Tetracycline.
Among various extracts, only ethanolic extract of Azadirachta indica
and aqueous and ethanolic extracts of Eucalyptus globulus and Bergenia
ciliata and ethanolic extract of Punica granatum were found to have
potentially promising activity against test microorganisms.
CONCLUSION:
Different
plant extracts show promising antimicrobial activity justifying their
usage in traditional medicines. This study will be continued to identify
more plants with potential antimicrobial components.
