Evaluation of the Antibacterial and Antifungal Properties of Mentha spicata Leaf Extracts against Clinically Relevant Pathogens

Abstract

Plant has been used as food from the beginning of life on earth. Their derivates are often as a medicine for the treatment of different kind of disease. Essential oils are great importance in case of infectious and opportunistic diseases treatment as well as food, pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries. Mint (Menta specita L) is an aromatic plant is considered of great importance all over the world. Moreover antifungal, antibacterial and anticancer activates of Essential oil of Menta specita has been proved. Supercritical fluid extraction (SFE) was used for the extraction of phytochemicals from the leaf of menta specita. In this research we evaluated the antibacterial activates of Mentha specita leaves extract against some Gram positive (Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus epidermidis) Gram  negative ( E.coli  and pseudomonas aerugionsa ) bacterial strains and fungi was evaluated in the present research by the agar well diffusion method. In case of staphylococcus, Methanolic, Ethanolic, and Ethyl acetate extract show significant zone of inhabation  of 16mm, 20mm, and 24mm respectively. It was found that mentha specita leaves extract inhabit the  growth of microorganism with great extent. In case of pseudomonas aeruginosa, Ethanolic extract show an activity  of 02mm of zone of inhabition while the ethyle acetate extract show activity of 14mm with zone of inhabition and Methanolic extract shows antibacterial activity of of 18mm. Ethyl acetate show antibacterial potential against Bacillus subtilus with inhabition zone of 15mm, against E.coli the zone of inhalation of Ethanolic and ethyle acetate extract was 14mm and 15mm respectively. Ethanolic extract of mentha specita show antifungal activity with significant zone of inhalation 16mm while the Methanolic and Ethyl acetate extracts of Mentha showed not good antifungal activity with zone of inhabation 15mm and 12mm respectively. Against Rhizopus, Ethanolic extract showed low inhabition  zone of 15mm while the antifungal effect of Methanolic and ethyl acetate of mentha specita was good with zone of inhabition 18mm and 21mm respectively. In of Aspargelus aferium, the Ethanolic extract of mentha specita shows good results with inhabation zone of 19mm while the Methanolic and ethyl acetate show poor zone of inhibition that is 16mm and 13mm respectively.  Also the increasing resistance of microorganism to conventional chemical and drugs is a serious and evident wordwide problem that has prompted research in to the identification of new biocides with good activity. The aim of this work to replace synthetic antibiotics by natural plant extract Mentha spicata is one the medicanal that has replace the commercially available antibiotic.