Original Articles: 2014 Vol: 6 Issue: 8
Antimicrobial activity of aqueous, ethanolic, methanolic, cyclohexanic extracts and essential oil of Nigella sativa seeds
Abstract
Most of the bacterial pathogens are resistant to existing synthetic antibacterial agents demanding an increasing effort to seek effective phytochemicals as antibacterial agents against such pathogens. Nigella sativa L. (black cumin) seeds play an important role in folk medicine and some of its major constituents are reported to be pharmacologically active. In this present work, Nigellasativa seed extracts were obtained using maceration extraction by various solvents (water, ethanol, methanol, and cyclohexan). The antibacterial and antifungal effects of different extracts and essential oil of seeds were investigated by the agar diffusion method against two gram positive (Bacillus subtilis CIP52.62 ,Staphylococcus aureus CIP4.83) and three gram negative strains of bacteria (Escherichia coli CIP53.126 ,Pseudomonas aeroginosa CIP82.118, Salmonella abony CIP80.39) and one strain of fungi (Candida albicans CIP48.72). All the extracts and essential oil showed varying degree of inhibition.