Antimutagenic effects of compounds obtained from Eclipta alba linn. against strains of Salmonella typhimurium

Abstract

In this experimental study, antimutagenic activity of compounds obtained from Eclipta alba Linn was screened by using Ames assay for detecting direct mutagenic activity and those requiring the metabolic activation. The crude compound extracted from Eclipta alba was considered as antimutagen and analyzed in this experiment. Two strains of Salmonella typhimurium, TA163 and TA96 were used to analyze the test. These two strains are confirmed as histidine requiring mutant strains. When the mutagen is added to the culture, the strain is mutated back, thereby loosing the histidine dependence for its growth. By this study, the crude compound of Eclipta alba prevents the strain to be mutated back to the non dependence for the genotyping of the Salmonella strains were performed by histidine requirement, rfa mutation analysis, UVrB mutation, R-factor analysis toxicity tests and antimutagenicity assay. The antimutagens obtained from the plant extract were determined for antimutagenic activity against direct acting mutagens and mutagen needing activation. For direct acting mutagens, NPD (N- nitro-o-phenyl diamine), MNNG (N- methyl-N-nitro-N-nitro soguanidine) and NaNa3 (sodium azide) with 1mg of the plant extract gives 98%, 95.2% and 90.7% inhibition the reverted colonies were observed whereas the mutagen needing activation 2-AAf (2-acetyl aminofluorine) gives 96.6% inhibition was observed. These above results indicated that the extract could inhibit the mutagenicity induced by direct acting mutagens as well as mutagens needing activation. Thus the extracts isolated from the test plant have possibility of antimutagenic activity of compound and further biochemicals extracted from the test plant will be analyzed.