Balaji Kaveti, Poh Xin Xian, Rebecca Chiang Siew Fern, Michelle Ting Lee Lee, Mirza Baig
The aim of this study was to investigate the antimicrobial and antioxidant activities of the seeds of Achyranthes aspera. The plant part was extracted with methanol to yield the crude extract. The antimicrobial activity test of the methanol extract of the seeds of Achranthes aspera was done using disc diffusion method. Standard antibiotic discs of Kanamycin (30 μg/disc) were used as standard. The crude extract was used at a concentration of 500 μg/disc. All the microorganisms were susceptible in various degrees to the extract. The methanol extract was found to be moderately active against Staphylococus aereus, Bacillus cereus, Bacillus subtilis, Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The zone of inhibition was found from 12 mm to 19 mm. The crude methanol extract was again studied for investigating free radical scavenging potentiality and was subjected to this study with 2, 2-Diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH). The methanol extract of the bark of the plant exhibited the potential free radical scavenging activity (antioxidant effect) having IC50 value of 54.405 μg/ml. Preliminary phytochemical analysis of the seed extracts revealed that the antibacterial and the radical scavenging activities are mainly due to the presence of the phenolic compounds especially alkaloids. The results obtained suggest that A. aspera could be exploited in the infections management of various diseases.
