Antimicrobial and Brine Shrimp Lethality of Fruit Extracts of Terminalia chebula. Isolation of a New Compound
Keywords:
Terminalia chebula, Antimicrobial activity, Cytotoxicity, 2-Hydroxy-3-acetoxy-12-oleanen-28-oic acid.Abstract
The n-hexane (HX), carbon tetrachloride (CT), chloroform (CF) and aqueous (AQ) soluble fractions of a crude methanol extract of fruits of
Terminalia chebula were subjected to antibacterial and antifungal activities and cytotoxicity against brine shrimp nauplii. The n-hexane
soluble partitionate of the methanolic extract exhibited significant antimicrobial activity and aqueous soluble partitionate showed only mild
sensitivity, whereas other partitionates did not show any activity. The brine shrimp lethality with LC50 values were 1.254, 0.826, 3.866 and
5.366 μg/mL for HX, CT, CF and AQ soluble partitionates respectively. A pure compound was isolated from the chloroform soluble
partitionate and the structure of the compound was elucidated as 2-hydroxy-3-acetoxy-12-oleanen-28-oic acid (2). Compound 2 was
isolated from Terminalia chebula for the first time.
