Abstract

ANTIBACTERIAL ACTIVITY OF COMBRETUM INDICUM (L.) DEFILIPPS FLOWER EXTRACTS AGAINST GRAM-POSITIVE AND GRAM-NEGATIVE HUMAN PATHOGENIC BACTERIA

Manoj Kumar*

ABSTRACT

Bacterial pathogens have evolved numerous defense mechanisms against antimicrobial agents; hence resistance to older and newly produced drugs is on the rise. The phenomenon of antibiotic resistance exhibited by the pathogenic microorganisms has led to the need for screening of several medicinal plants for their potential antimicrobial activity. Thus the present study was undertaken to investigate the antibacterial activity of crude flower extracts of Combretum indicum (L.) DeFilipps against gram-positive as well as gram-negative human pathogenic bacterial strains. Agar well diffusion assay method was used to determine the antibacterial activity of the extracts. The different solvent extracts have shown marked inhibition against the tested human pathogenic bacterial strains. The results showed that Staphylococcus aureus was highly susceptible to the extracts as compared with the Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Streptococcus sp. and Salmonella typhimurium, bacterial strains. The results also showed that the methanol extract of Combretum indicum was the most effective as the widest inhibitory zone was observed compared to the ethanol as well as aqueous extracts. The commercially available, standard antibiotic streptomycin offers relatively higher inhibition as compared to the tested different solvent extracts. This revealed that the crude flower extracts of Combretum indicum have antibacterial activity against the treated bacterial strains, probably could be used to control infections associated with these human pathogenic bacteria.

Keywords: Antibacterial, Combretum indicum, Solvents, Zone of Inhibition. Human Pathogens.