In vitro assessment of the antioxidant and antibacterial activities of some shade tree barks from tea plantation of Terai region of West Bengal

Abstract

The aim of this research was to evaluate the antioxidant and antibacterial activities of six shade tree barks. Barks of six plants were subjected to formulate the extracts with nine different nonpolar and polar solvents like hexane, chloroform, ethanol, methanol etc. The six bark extracts were assessed for their free radical scavenging and antibacterial potentialities by employing the DPPH scavenging assay and well diffusion methods, respectively. All the extracts were found to be more or less exhibited DPPH scavenging activity but methanolic extracts of Senna siamea; Derris robusta; Leucaena leucocephala were having the highest scavenging abilities. All the plants showed low to high antibacterial ability against Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae where chloroform and aqueous extracts as well as all the extracts of Melia azedarach had no effect at all. So, this present study accomplish that the bark extracts of these shade trees could be exploited to develop the natural bioactive agents although further research are needed.