Avaliação do potencial antimicrobiano in vitro das espécies vegetais Coccoloba mollis Casaretto, Triplaris americana Linnaeus, e Coutarea hexandra (Jacq.) K. Schum

Abstract

Infections caused by microorganisms are a serious public health problem, mainly due to the emergence of multi drug resistant bacteria and fungi. Thus, the search for new alternative therapeutic approaches remains, being the goal of several research groups worldwide. The World Health Organization (WHO) recognizes the value and encourages the use of traditional medicine knowledge. Brazil has a large number of plant species and many of them are considered medicinal. However, despite quite a lot of them are popularly used they were not scientifically validated yet. The Northeast region hosts an extensive native flora with many species showing therapeutic properties, but most of them scientifically unproven. As an example, there were representatives of the families Rubiaceae and Polygonaceae, the latter being the fourth largest family between angiosperms. Amongst Alagoas flora there are species of these two families, such as Coccoloba mollis Casaretto (1844) (Polygonaceae), Triplaris americana Linnaeus (Polygonaceae) and Coutarea hexandra Schum. (Rubiaceae), which genera have species cited by its ethnomedicinal uses. The aim of this study was to evaluate the antimicrobial activity of crude extracts and fraction obtained from these plant species. Tests were carried out in Petri dishes by the disk diffusion method to evaluate relative effectiveness of tested samples as antimicrobial agents, by measuring zones of inhibition on culture of Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC 25923), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (ATCC 27853) e Candida albicans (ATCC 10231). The minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC) was determined by microdilution in BHI broth (Brain Heart Infusion). Plant species were also tested against Artemia salina larvae for preliminary evaluation of its acute toxicity. Of the 69 samples tested, 17 were effective against S. aureus. The methanol fraction from the dichloromethane extract of the roots of C. hexandra was considered the most promising because it presented the highest percentage bacterial growth inhibition. Of the samples subjected to MIC determination all were active with values ranging from 125 to 500 μg/mL. None of the tested species were active against P. aeruginosa or C. albicans. Regarding the toxicity on A. salina, in preliminary tests 32 of the 69 tested samples were non-toxic. The others were submitted to quantitative test 10 of them exhibited non-toxic effects. Among the samples that showed toxicity LC50 values ranged from 2.68 to 953.9 g/mL. The three plant species showed antibacterial activity against S. aureus. For toxicity against A. salina, the 27 toxic samples, 17 are species of the family Polygonaceae, and the rest of the species C. hexandra