Determination of Phytochemicals, Antimicrobial, Antioxidant and Allelopathic Effects of Fagonia cretica L., collected from Jamshoro, Pakistan

Abstract

Medicinal plant Fagonia cretica L., is well known in traditional medicines for curing various complaints of human beings from ancient times and is locally known as Dhamasa. Previous many studies have reported the presence of many phytochemicals, antimicrobial, and antioxidant properties in the various parts of this plant. Therefore, here in this study, we have presented a comprehensive study on the presence of similar medicinal and chemical properties of Dhamsa found in Jamshoro District, Pakistan. For this study, extracts of the root, stem, leaf, and pod of the plant were prepared separately from three different solvents, water, ethanol, and methanol. Then the amount and presence of various phytochemicals, antimicrobial, antioxidant properties, and allelopathic effects were determined in all the extracts. The obtained results of this study confirm the presence of medicinal important phytochemicals in the plant extracts. The antimicrobial testing of this plant proved its highest activity against E. coli (16 ±1.4mm), Salmonella typhi (18±0.7mm), and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (15±1.4mm) in methanol, water, and ethanol extracts respectively. The presence of antioxidant activities was also observed in the ethanolic extract of the leaf at about 0.98 mg/ml. While this plant showed allelopathic effects on the growth of radish and spinach plants. So, we have concluded this study that Fagonia cretica L., collected from Jamshoro has the same or more important properties compared to the same plant from other regions, which proves the similar significant value of the Fagonia cretica plant of Jamshoro in various fields of medicinal sciences.