CHROMATOGRAPHIC SEPARATION OF AQUEOUS LEAF EXTRACTS OF ACACIA NILOTICA AND CHARACTERIZATION OF THE ACTIVE CHEMICAL COMPOUNDS FOR ANTIBACTERIAL APPLICATION

Abstract

Medicinal plants are at great interest to drug industries, as herbal medicines and their derivative products are often prepared from crude plant extracts. The present study aimed to determine the antibacterial activity against bacterial isolates form Acaia nilotica leaves. The crude aqueous leaves extract of Acacia nilotica showed the antibacterial activity for all the bacterial isolates at three different concentrations (60, 80 and 100 mg/ml), with E. coli having the higher activity and S. typhi with lower activity for all the concentrations. Sub-fraction B3 showed the antibacterial activity for all the bacterial isolates, while sub-fraction B4 showing the antibacterial activity for only E. coli. Sub-fraction B1, B2 and B5 showed zero activity for all the bacterial isolates. The FT-IR analysis revealed the presence of OH, C-H, =C-H, C=O, C=C, C-O functional groups. The result of GC-MS analysis showed the presence of eleven bioactive compounds.  The antibacterial activity might be due to presence of phytochemicals in the plant extract such as terpenoids, flavonoids, phenols, glycosides, saponins, alkaloids, steroids, and tannins. Hence, the need to isolate and identified the active chemical compounds that have medicinal applications in the fraction as well as to elucidate their exact mechanism of action in different disorders.