ABSTRACT
The present study was designed to investigate the antioxidant and cytotoxic activity of the methanol, ethyl acetate and n-hexane extracts of bark of Aegle marmelos. The antioxidant properties was assessed by using 1, 1-diphenyl-2- picrylhydrazyl radical (DPPH) and Nitric Oxide (NO) scavenging capacity. The methanolic, ethyl acetate and n-hexane bark extracts of Aegle marmelos showed potential DPPH free radical scavenging activity having IC50 values of 37.056 μg/ml, 43.379 μg/ml and 66.180 μg/ml respectively compared with the IC50 value of Ascorbic acid 33.447 μg/ml. The Ethyl acetate extract of Aegle marmelos displayed excellent antioxidant activity in nitric oxide (NO) scavenging capacity assay with IC50 value of 28.377 μg/ml compared with the standard ascorbic acid, IC50 value of 22.175 μg/ml. The cytotoxicity assay was performed by applying brine shrimp lethality bioassay method. Among all the fractions, n-hexane extract shown profound cytotoxic activity with LC50 value of 4.482 μg/ml that was followed by methanolic and ethyl acetate having LC50 values of 5.278 and 5.278 μg/ml respectively in comparison with the standard vincristine sulfate with LC50 value of 3.364 μg/ml. The findings of the present study suggest that the extracts from Aegle marmelos bark have potential cytotoxicity and antioxidant effects.