Abstract

BIOACTIVITY OF THE BARK OF MACARANGA INDICA WIGHT IC (EUPHORBIACEAE)

Amina Khatun*, Mahmudur Rahman, Afroza Akter, Sumiya Islam, Mahfuja Akter,
Sumaiya Kabir

Abstract

The ethanol extract of Macaranga indica Wight Ic, the tralatitiously used medicative plant belonging to the family Euphorbiaceae has been investigated for the presence of its secondary metabolites and evaluation of biological activities of the crude extractive for the brine shrimp lethality bioassay and antioxidant activity for the first time. In chemical group tests, the result showed that the ethanol extract of Macaranga indica contains tannin, flavonoid, saponin, gum, steroid and alkaloid groups. In brine shrimp lethality bioassay after 18 hrs, the LC50 of crude extract and standard vincristine sulphate were 95.17 and 95.15 μg/ml respectively, after 24hrs, the values were 21.71 and 2.75 μg/ml respectively. In free radical scavenging assay, IC50 value of ethanol extract was 0.79 μg/ml in comparison to the standard trolox 0.40 μg/ml. From the study, it was evident that, the ethanol extract of M. indica showed moderate cytotoxicity and very strong antioxidant activity.

Keywords: Macaranga indica, Euphorbiaceae, Cytotoxic, Brine shrimp, Antioxidant, DPPH.