Towards sustainable antimicrobials from plants: Some ways to abridge current methodological approaches

Abstract

Plants are potential sources for new antimicrobials that might be helpful in combating antimicrobial resistance. Screening of plant materials for antimicrobial activities is an essential step towards discovery of new alternatives to current antibiotics. This article presents strategies allowing to simplify some methodological approaches used in initial testing of plant materials for their antimicrobial properties. Particular attention is given to sensitivity testing without extraction based on utilisation of agarose hydrogel tablets and dry powders. Other aspects relate to testing fractionated extracts and rapid determination of inhibition modes directly from zones of inhibition in diffusion assays. Using these approaches could facilitate standardised preliminary screening for new antimicrobials to make this process more productive.