Volatile oils of Spondias mombin L. leaves as potent antioxidant and antibacterial agent.

Abstract

Article InformationEssential oils contain volatile compounds which have been used as potent antioxidant and antimicrobial agents for decades. This is because of the presence of many active components in the oils. In this research, the essential oil of air-dried leaves of Spondias mombin obtained through hydrodistillation was characterized by gas chromatographyflame ionization detection (GC-FID) and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry analyses (GC-MS). The antimicrobial assay was carried out using the agar diffusion method while the antioxidant assay was carried out using the 1,1-diphenyl-2picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) antioxidant assay, ferric reducing antioxidant power, nitric oxide radical scavenging, total antioxidant capacity and lipid peroxidation assays on the oils. The oil yielded 1.20 % per dry weight basis of the sample. The oil was composed majorly of mono and sesquiterpenoids. The major components of the volatile oil of S. mombin were caryophyllene (35.78 %), δ-cadinene (21.56 %), humulene (11.33 %), γ-muurolene (5.86 %), (-)-isogermacrene D (4.47 %) and nerolidol (4.46 %).The highest sensitivity of the oil was on K. pneumoniae with minimum inhibitory concentration(MIC) and minimal bactericidal concentration (MBC) values of 62.40 and 122.80 μg/mL, followed P. aeruginosa (MIC and MBC values of 70.20 and 132.10 μg/mL) and E. coli (MIC and MBC values of 86.60 and 178.50 μg/mL). The volatile oil of S. mombin showed good antioxidant activity with 41.22 μg/mL, 5.55 μg/g and 83.24 % for DPPH, FRAP and β-carotene bleaching assays. The airdried leaf oil showed strong activity against Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae, as well as a promising antioxidant potency.