Phytochemical Screening, Antibacterial, Antifungal, Anti-Biofilm and Antioxidant Activity of Azadiracta Indica A. Juss. Flowers

The present study involves investigation of Azadiracta Indica flowers with respect to its pharmacognostic properties, phytochemical screening, and its application as anti-oxidant, anti-biofilm, and anti-microbial agent. The Pharmacognostic characteristics were evaluated with respect to moisture content, total ash content, acid, and water-soluble ash content, swelling index, foaming index, and metal content. The macro and micronutrient content of the crude drug was estimated by AAS and Flame photometric methods and it gives the quantitative estimation of minerals, where calcium is present in abundance (88.64 mg/L). Soxhlet extraction was carried out in the increasing order of polarity of the solvent viz Petroleum Ether (PE), Acetone (AC), and Hydroalcohol (20 %) (HA) to extract the bioactive compounds. The characterization of the bioactive compounds of all the three extract have been carried out using gcms and lcms. The presence of 13 major compounds have been identified in PE extract and 8 compounds in AC extract using gcms studies. The HA extract is found to contain polyphenols, flavanoids, and glycosides. The antioxidant activity of the extracts was evaluated by DPPH, FRAP, and Phosphomolybdenum assay. This reveals that HA extract shows good scavenging activity than PE and AC extracts which is well correlated with the bioactive compounds, especially phenols which are present as a major component in the extract. The anti-microbial activity was investigated via Agar well diffusion method for all the extracts. Among all the extracts HA extract shows good antibacterial activity with MIC of 25 μg/mL and AC extract shows good anti-fungal activity with MIC of 25 μg/mL. The antibiofilm assay confirms that the HA extract shows good biofilm inhibition about 94 % among other extracts when tested on human pathogens. The results confirm that the HA extract of A. Indica flowers will be an excellent source of natural anti-oxidant and also antimicrobial agents. This paves the way for its potential uses in herbal product formulation.