Biological activity of some Egyptian Medicinal Plants

Abstract

Medicinal plants have been used as a source of therapies since ancient times in Egypt. The present study was designed to investigate the anti-bacterial, anti-oxidant and anti-tumor activities of aqueous and organic extracts from twenty selected medicinal plants, cultivated in Egypt then evaluate the anti-bacterial and anti-tumor activity of the most abundant identified phenolic compounds present in the best two plants using HPLC. The disk diffusion method and micro-broth dilution were used to determine MIC and MBC of the samples against 10 bacterial strains belonging to five species, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Klebsiella pneumonia, Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus pyogenes. While phytochemical screening assay followed by 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) assay were used to assess the anti-oxidant of the extracts, the large intestinal carcinoma (CACO) cell line was used to evaluate the anti-tumor of these extracts by Sulfo-Rhodamine B colorimetric (SRB) assay. The results indicated that all studied crude extracts were able to inhibit the growth of at least three of the tested bacteria. All studied plants have, qualitatively, various bioactive components and were observed to be high to moderate antioxidant agents. Moreover, IC50 values below 20 μg/mL were recorded for the crude extract of Origanum marjorana, Olea Europaea and Curcuma longa in anti-tumor assay. Rutin, benzoic acid and salicylic acid were the