Antimicrobial and antioxidant studies of the leaf extracts of Lophira lanceolata (Male Shaere)

Abstract

Lophira lanceolata is a prevalent traditional herbs used to treat disease caused by fungi and bacteria in numerous parts of the world. The leave of the plant was extracted using ethanol to yield the crude extract (FE-01; 95.40 g). The crude ethanol (FE-01) was further fractionated by maceration using solvents of different polarity in the sequence; pet ether, chloroform, acetone and methanol. This yielded FP-01; 22.20 g, FC-01; 6.78 g, FA-01; 58.50 g; and FM-01; 2.75 g fractions. All the fractions were screened for antibacterial assay against S. aurus and E. coli; and antifungal assay against A. flavus and A. Niger. In general the result showed dose-response relationship. Methanol fraction displayed the highest activity against E. coli with zone of inhibition of 14 mm relative to 30 mm for gentimacin as positive control at 500 µg/ml. Additionally, the fraction were subjected to antioxidant activity using DPPH. Pet ether fraction showed the highest antioxidant properties of IC50 23.40 µg/ml relative to Vitamin C standard, IC50 value of 25.80 µg/ml.