Assessment of the antimicrobial potential of the selected phytochemically riched medicinal plants against the antibiotic resistant pathogenic bacterial strains

Abstract

Tribal communities of Tanawal have been known for the formulations of herbal remedies and their supply to pharmaceutical industries for more than 50 years in KPK, Pakistan. This study aims to report on the ethnomedicinal uses and evaluation of the medicinal efficacy of eight selected medicinal plants of Tanawal region, KPK. These plants were selected due to their popularity and frequency of utilization among communities in the study area. Anti-microbial activities of three different kinds of plant extracts (ethanol, methanol, n-hexane) were evaluated against four strains of bacteria Bacillus subtilis (ATCC 6058), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (ATCC 7222) (gram-positive) and Escherichia coli (ATCC 25928), Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC 6537) (gram-negative) bacteria. An agar disc diffusion assay was performed to investigate the anti-bacterial activity. Results exhibited significant control of all extracts over bacterial growth but the results of ethanolic extracts were most prominent. Moreover, the choice of plant has a statistically significant influence on the zone of inhibition in the case of gram-positive strains but less effect for the gram-negative strains. Further, analysis revealed a significant effect of extract concentration on the zone of inhibition for both grampositive and negative bacterial strains. Some concentrations are even better than the reference drugs i.e. chloramphenicol and streptomycin.