Antifungal activity of total and fractionated phenolic extracts from two wild edible herbs

Maria Antonia Gatto,Vito Linsalata,Donato Di Venere,Simona Marianna Sanzani,Piero Tardia,Mariax Pieralice,Lucrezia Sergio

doi:10.4236/ns.2013.58108

Maria Antonia Gatto, Vito Linsalata + Show 5 more

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https://doi.org/10.4236/ns.2013.58108

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Abstract

The chemical characterization of phenolic extracts of salad burnet (Sanguisorba minor Scop. s.l.) and broomrape (Orobanche crenata Forsk.) was performed. Active fractions were separated and characterized and, in the case of O. crenata, two phenolic compounds, verbascoside and is overbascoside, were quantitatively extracted, purified and characterized. These compounds proved to be effective in reducing the growth of some important fungi responsible for the decay of fresh fruit and vegetables in postharvest. Verbascoside showed significant activity against Penicillium italicum, fairly inhibited Monilinia laxa, P. expansum, and Aspergillus carbonarius, and showed little activity against Botrytis cinerea, M. fructicola and P. digitatum. Isoverbascoside completely inhibited B. cinerea, P. digitatum, P. italicum, and P. expansum; it fairly inhibited M. laxa and A. carbonarius; while it showed to be less effective against M. fructicola. The obtained results support the possible use of some wild edible plants as a source of phenolic substances for the postharvest biological control of fresh fruit and vegetable rots.

Highlights

The growing attention of consumers, that require fruit and vegetables free of pesticide residues, the legislative restrictions that aim at increasing food safety, and the need for high quality products, have stimulated research towards the development of alternative defence systems, such as natural pesticides with a lower environmental impact, able to limit the development of alterations on fresh fruit and vegetables in postharvest [1].The most important postharvest fungal pathogens are Botrytis cinerea, Monilinia spp., Penicillium spp., and Aspergillus spp. [2]
The use of natural substances extracted from plants with antimicrobial activity is considered a promising new strategy for reducing postharvest diseases, replacing or supporting the use of synthetic fungicides, to ensure an acceptable level of disease control associated with a low environmental impact
The obtained fractions were assayed for their in vitro antifungal activity against B. cinerea, P. digitatum, P. italicum, P. expansum, M. laxa, M. fructicola and A. carbonarius

Summary

Introduction

The growing attention of consumers, that require fruit and vegetables free of pesticide residues, the legislative restrictions that aim at increasing food safety, and the need for high quality products, have stimulated research towards the development of alternative defence systems, such as natural pesticides with a lower environmental impact, able to limit the development of alterations on fresh fruit and vegetables in postharvest [1].The most important postharvest fungal pathogens are Botrytis cinerea, Monilinia spp., Penicillium spp., and Aspergillus spp. [2]. The growing attention of consumers, that require fruit and vegetables free of pesticide residues, the legislative restrictions that aim at increasing food safety, and the need for high quality products, have stimulated research towards the development of alternative defence systems, such as natural pesticides with a lower environmental impact, able to limit the development of alterations on fresh fruit and vegetables in postharvest [1]. The reduced number of authorized active ingredients and the increased resistance of some postharvest fungal pathogens to the few authorized fungicides have increased efforts to develop alternative or complementary control means [1,4,5,6,7,8,9]. The use of natural substances extracted from plants with antimicrobial activity is considered a promising new strategy for reducing postharvest diseases, replacing or supporting the use of synthetic fungicides, to ensure an acceptable level of disease control associated with a low environmental impact. It is well known that in nature there are many systems able to release molecules with cytotoxic or more generally biocidal activity, that are the result of evolutionary processes designed to the self-protection of plants from pathogens, herbivores and competitors [12]

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