Abstract

Derris brevipes var brevipes, a common medicinal plant, has multiple uses in traditional system of medicine and in particular it is used as a memory-enhancing agent for centuries. The plant and its extracts have been evaluated for a number of activities like anti-inflammatory, cardiotonic, sedative and neuron-muscular. The plant extract was evaluated for the antimutagenicity and mutagenicity studies in order to confirm the safety of its usage. Ethanol extracts of Derris brevipes var brevipes, showed no mutagenicity up to 5 mg/plate when tested with Salmonella typhimurium TA97a, TA98, TA100, TA102 and TA1535 strains with or without metabolic activation. On the other hand ethanol extract of Derris brevipes var brevipes, showed a significant protective effect against the mutagenicity induced by mutagen in S. typhimurium TA98 and TA100 strain with or without metabolic activation. The results of these studies indicate that Derris brevipes var brevipes, is non-mutagenic in the Ames test, exhibit protection against the mutagenicity induced by 4-nitroquinolene-1-oxide, sodium azide and 2-aminoflourene in TA98 and TA100 strain. Keywords: Derris brevipes var brevipes, Antimutagenicity, Mutagenicity and Salmonella typhimurium

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