Abstract

ANTIBACTERIAL AND ANTIOXIDANT ACTIVITY OF SEED METHANOLIC EXTRACT OF APIUM GRAVEOLENS IN VITRO

Hiba Khaleel Ibrahim*

Abstract

Natural metabolites especially those extracted from plants are useful for curing human cancer through their cytotoxicity and antioxidant activities as well as for the control of bacterial infection. Celery (Apium graveolens) is a medicinal herb used as a food, and also in traditional medicine. The extract of Apium gravelens seeds was prepared using methanol. The antioxidant activity of Apium gravelens seeds alcoholic extract (0.5, 1, 1.5, 2 and 2.5 mg/ml) were tested using DPPH method. The antimicrobial activity was assessed using agar diffusion method against Staphylococcus mutans, Streptococcus pyogenes, Klebsiella pneumonia, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Escherichia coli. Results indicated that the extract showed a scavenging activity of the DPPH in which the IC50 value for alcoholic extract was 2.31 mg/ml which is comparatively higher than the IC50 (1.10 mg/ml) of ascorbic acid. The extract exhibited antimicrobial activity on almost microorganisms tested, in which an inhibition zone recorded by using 2.5 mg/ml on Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Streptococcus pyogenes, however no inhibition zone showed using the same concentration on Klebsiella pneumonia, Staphylococcus mutans and Escherichia coli. Increasing the concentration of the extract, resulted in increasing the inhibitory activity against the sensitive microbial isolates and started to affect Klebsiella pneumonia and Staphylococcus mutans, though still no inhibitory activity against E. coli at 5 mg/ml. The antimicrobial effect reached its higher activity by using 10 mg/ml from the alcoholic extract, in which all the microbial isolates were affected.

Keywords: Klebsiella pneumonia, Staphylococcus mutans and Escherichia coli.