Introduction
Ginger (
Zingiber officinale
) has been one of the most commonly consumed herbal medicines for a long time to treat several common diseases. Antibacterial activity, antioxidant properties and many bioactive compounds in ginger have been identified previously, which could be used as an alternative method to treat many infectious diseases.
Methods
The current study evaluates ginger’s biochemical profile using qualitative and quantitative analysis and its bioactive potentials using antioxidant and antimicrobial assays against
Streptococcus mutans
and selective oral microbes. HPLC analysis was performed for the quantitative analysis. DPPH and disc diffusion assays were used for antioxidant and antimicrobial activities. The antimicrobial activity was checked against
Streptococcus mutans, Enterococcus faecalis, Staphylococcus
spp., and
Lactobacillus
spp. All solvents were removed by rotary evaporation before testing the dried extracts.
Results
The observed IC
50
value showed that distilled water extract exhibited the highest antioxidant activity (43.9), followed by ethanol extract (52.4), and the lowest activity was observed in
n
-butanol extract (91.2) and
n
-hexane (90.6). Different plant extracts have shown significant antibacterial activity (
p
= 0.001) against each bacterium. The highest antibacterial activity against tested bacteria was observed in
n
-hexane, chloroform and ethanol extracts. In comparison, the ethyl acetate,
n
-butanol and water extracts showed low antibacterial activity.
Conclusion
This study emphasizes that
Zingiber officinale
(
Z. officinale
) against Gram-positive bacteria is an effective antimicrobial herb. Furthermore, it can be used as a potential natural source of antioxidants. Further studies on the toxicity analysis of ginger are recommended.