The Antimicrobial Activity of Plant Extracts from Punica granatum, Camellia, and Prosopis farcta on Some Antibiotic Resistant Bacterial Species

Abstract

Medicinal plants play important role in the development of therapeutic agents, for curing diseases. The study was conducted to evaluate the antibacterial activity of aqueous and ethanolic extracts of three medicinal plants; pomegranate (Punica granatum), black tea (Camellia) and Kharnoob (Prosopis farcta) against some antibiotic resistant isolates The agar-well diffusion method was used for the determination of the antibacterial activity of the extract at different concentration (25,50,100, and 200) mg/ml. The bacteria, isolated from infected wound and diarrheal stool, then identified using routine cultural, morphological, and biochemical testes, The Kirby-Bauer antibiotic susceptibility assay showed that the selected bacterial isolates demonstrated was high resistance to most common used antibiotics, and different multidrug resistance patterns had been seen. The results showed that aqueous and ethanolic extracts from the peels of P. granatum peels had strong activity against bacterial isolates from wound infections caused by Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus epidermidis, Staphylococcus saprophyticus, and Escherichia coli. In addition, the aqueous and ethanolic extract of P. granatum pulp, and black tea leaves demonstrated high antibacterial activity against a number of bacterial isolates obtained from diarrheal stool samples, including; E. coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, and Proteus mirabilis. In contrast extract from P. farcta didn’t show any antimicrobial activity. It can be concluded that the aqueous and ethanolic extracts of P. granatum (pulp and peel), and black tea had broad spectrum of antibacterial activity against different bacterial species, but ethanolic extracts were more active than aqueous extracts. Moreover, the action of these extracts increased with increasing their concentration. Hence these plant may be used in developing novel, and economic therapeutic agents for treatment of wounds, and gastrointestinal tract disorders causing bacterial strain. Further investigations on the antimicrobial activity of pomegranate, and black tea, against other pathogenic bacteria, are recommended.