Abstract
Increased curiosity on natural plant products has been raised due to problems of cost, unavailability, and after-effects of countless synthetic drugs. Worrisome, many plant-derived formulations lack phytochemically or toxicological screening. Hence, this study phytochemical and elemental screened the ethanolic leaf extract of Acalypha wilkesiana and as well as determining acute toxicity in adult male Wistar rats. The leaves were obtained in Benin City, Nigeria. Ethanol extraction was carried out on leaves and the extract was subjected to proximate, qualitative, and quantitative phytochemical screening and elemental analysis. Acute toxicity was determined on 12 adult male Wistar rats following Lork’s method. Proximate analysis revealed a high presence of carbohydrate, ash, fiber, and moisture. The qualitative and quantitative evaluation showed the abundance of alkaloids (68.7 ± 0.120%), flavonoids (34.7 ± 0.001%) and minute (<1mg/g) saponins, tannins, phenol, and terpenes. The extract contain nutritive (vitamin E = 1.184 ± 0.055µg/g; vitamin A = 0.0066 ± 0.003µg/g; vitamin C = 0.046 ± 0.037µg/g) and anti-nutritive (oxalates = 229.780 ± 16.93mg/100g; cyanide=0.162 ± 0.006 mg/100g; phytate = 0.131 ± 0.01mg/100g) elements. The elemental evaluation showed an abundance of potassium, sodium, and chloride with traces of cadmium and lead and the absence of manganese and copper. There was no sign of acute toxicity or mortality at an extract dose of 5000mg/kg. These findings indicate the ethanol leaf extract of A. wilkesiana as a rich source of phytochemicals and major macro elements and high safety at 5000mg/kg dose. Considering the several components in the leaves extract, Acalypha wilkesiana leaf might be pharmacological significant for the biological system.
Highlights
Herbal medicine or botanical medicine or phytomedicine sometimes referred to as herbalism which is the use of herbs for their therapeutic or medicinal values; refers to using plants seeds, flowers, roots for the medicinal purpose [1]
Qualitative and quantitative phytochemical screening was done using the method of Harborne [26] and Trease and Evans [27], to identify active constituents and simple chemical tests to detect the presence of secondary plant constituents such as alkaloids, tannins, flavonoids, saponins, sterols, phenols, glycosides and reducing sugars
The study of the chemical constituents and the active principles of medicinal plants have acquired a lot of importance all over the world (1)
Summary
Herbal medicine or botanical medicine or phytomedicine sometimes referred to as herbalism which is the use of herbs for their therapeutic or medicinal values; refers to using plants seeds, flowers, roots for the medicinal purpose [1]. It is the oldest form of health care known to mankind. About 80% of the world population in developing countries depend on herbal medicines for primary health care because of better cultural acceptability, safety, efficacy, potent, inexpensive, and lesser side effects [2]. In most of the world today medicinal plants are increasingly used as contraceptives, abortifacients, emmenagogues or oxytocic [4], antihypertensive [5], hypoglycemic [6,7,8], hypolipidemic [7], antibacterial and antifungal [9,10,11]), treatment of skin diseases [12], One of such plant is Acalypha wilkesiana.
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