Abstract

Objective: To investigate the antibacterial activity, using cold and hot extraction procedures with five solvents, petroleum ether, acetone, ethanol, methanol and water to validate medicinal uses of Butea monosperma Lam (B. monosperma) in controlling infections; and to qualitatively estimate phytochemical constituents of leaf-extracts of the plant. Methods: The antibacterial activity of leaf-extracts was evaluated by the agar-well diffusion method against clinically isolated 12 Gram-positive and -negative multidrug resistant (MDR) pathogenic bacteria in vitro. Values of minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC) of leaf-extracts against each bacterium were obtained in a 96-well micro-titre plate, by broth dilution micro-titre plate technique. Results: The presence of tannins, flavonoids, starch, glycosides and carbohydrates in different leaf extracts was established. Pathogenic bacteria used were, Acinetobacter sp., Chromobacterium violaceum, Citrobacter freundii, Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Salmonella typhi, Shigella sp., Enterococcus sp., Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus), methicillin resistant S. aureus and vancomycin resistant S. aureus, along with standard bacterial strains. These MDR bacteria had been recorded to have significant inhibitions by leaf extracts, obtained by cold and hot extraction procedures with five solvents. In addition, the hot aqueous extract against Enterococcus sp. had the highest inhibition zone-size (21 mm). Ciprofloxacin 30 µg/disc was the positive/reference control and the diluting solvent, 10% dimethyl sulphoxide was the negative control. Recorded MIC values of different extracts ranged between 0.23 and 13.30 mg/mL, and MBC values were 0.52 to 30.00 mg/mL, for these bacteria. Conclusions: Leaf-extracts with hot water and ethanol had shown significant antibacterial activity against all bacteria. B. monosperma leaf-extract could be used in treating infectious diseases, caused by the range of tested bacteria, as complementary and alternate medicine.

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