Methanol extracts from the leaves, stems and roots of Mentha piperita and Lantana camara were investigated for their anthelmintic activity against Pheritima posthuma. Each extract was studied in the bioassay at 20 mg/ml, which involved determination of time of paralysis and time of death of the worms. Both the extracts of both plants exhibited considerable anthelmintic activities, and the order of sensitivity of the extracts to the worms was stems > roots > leaves for the M. piperita and stems > leaves >roots for the L. camara. The methanol extracts of stems of both M. piperita and L. camara were found to be the most active. Albendazole (20 mg/ml) and distilled water were included in the assay as standard reference drug and control, respectively. Key words: Mentha piperita, Lantana camara, Pheritima posthuma, In vitro anthelmintic activity. Dhaka Univ. J. Pharm. Sci. Vol.5(1-2) 2006 The full text is of this article is available at the Dhaka Univ. J. Pharm. Sci. website

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Caesalpinia bonducella L. is a medicinal plant belonging to the family Caesalpiniaceae. The plant is found in all over India. The plant is a large prickly shrub. It is popular in indigenous system of medicine like Ayurveda, Siddha, Homoeopathy and Unani. In Indian traditional plant medicine, it has been considered as an important remedy for the treatment of several diseases. The plant has been reported to possess antimalarial, antifungal, antioxidant, anticancer, antipyretic, antifertility antiviral and antimalarial etc. activities of various parts of C bonducella plant. It can be concluded that C. bonducella can become the best source of medicine in future on various ailments with further investigations. Hence attempts have been made to take collect and compile the information about the traditional use of various parts of C.bonducella in various ailments, chemical constituents from various parts and the effective use of various extracts for treatment of different diseases. Keywords:  Caesalpinia bonducella , Pharmacology, Nutritional Values.

& Curcumin, piperine, and boswellic acid are important phytoconstituent present in Curcuma longa, Piper nigrum and Boswellia serrate, respectively. These plants are used traditionally in the treatment of arthritis. In the present study an attempt has been made to develop a HPTLC method for quantitative estimation of curcumin, piperine, and boswellic acid from polyherbal transdermal formulations (patch) prepared for the treatment of arthritis. The method employed TLC aluminium plates precoated with silica gel 60F 254 as the stationary phase. The solvent system consisted of chloroform: ethyl acetate: formic acid (7.5 mL þ 6 ml þ 0.2 mL). This system was found to give compact spots for curcumin (Rf value of 0.48 AE 0.02), piperine (Rf value of 0.52 AE 0.03), and boswellic acid (Rf value of 0.61 AE 0.03). Densitometric analysis of curcumin, piperine, and boswellic acid was carried out in the absorbance mode at 540 nm after derivatization. The % of curcumin, piperine, and boswellic acid from transdermal patch was found to be 95.41, 98.09, and 98.54, which was well within the limits. This HPTLC method was found to be reproducible, accurate, and can detect curcumin, piperine, and boswellic acid at nanogram level. The developed HPTLC method would be an important tool in the quality control method for polyherbal formulations.

Studies on the effect of various adjuvants on growth and development of Nomuraea rileyi (Farlow) Samson was undertaken with a view to select suitable adjuvant for developing formulation. It was revealed that the N.rileyi formulations with combination of adjuvants helped in increasing production of fungal biomass at 10 DAI. Based on the results it is concluded that the overall performance of the adjuvants for growth and development of N.rileyi in series of lab experimentation out of 96 test formulations. 10 formulation comprising 1) N.r.+HO (1%), 2)N.r+SFO(1%), 3) N.r.+GH(0.5%), 4) N.r.+TW(0.5%)+ GH(0.5%), 5)N.r.+GLY(2%)+SFO(1%), 6)N.r.+ GLY(2%)+GH (0.5%), 7) N.r.+SFO (1%)+GH(0.5%), 8)N.r.+TW(0.5%)+ GLY(2%)+ SFO(1%) + CMC (0.5%), 9) N.r.+ TW(0.5%)+GLY(2%)+HO (1%) and 10) N.r.+TW (0.5%) + GLY (2%) + CMC(0.5%) were emerged out as most promising and advanced stage formulations of N. rileyi.