Antibacterial, Cytotoxic and Antioxidant Activity of Crude Extract of Marsilea Quadrifolia

The main aim of this study was to find out the antibacterial, antioxidant and cytotoxic activity of petroleum ether, chloroform and ethyl acetate extracts of Marsilea quadrifolia (Family: Marsileaceae). For antibacterial test, Disc diffusion technique was used against 5 Gram positive and 11 Gram negative human pathogenic bacteria. The range of zone of inhibition of chloroform and ethyl acetate extracts was 9 to 20 mm. The petroleum ether extract did not show any zone of inhibition against any tested pathogenic bacteria. The Brine shrimp lethality bioassay method was used to determine the cytotoxicity activities and Vincristin sulphate was used as a positive control. The LC50 values of standard Vincristin sulphate, petroleum ether, chloroform and ethyl acetate extracts were 6.628μg/ml, 9.543μg/ml 7.820 μg/ml, and 8.589µg/ml respectively. All the fractions showed potent antioxidant activity, of which the ethyl acetate fraction demonstrated the strongest antioxidant activity with the IC50 value of 50.1053 μg/ml.