Studies on the elemental composition and anti fungal activity of medicinal plant Lippia nodiflora L against skin fungi

Lippia nodiflora L, an indigenous herb has many medicinal uses. Present work was carried out to study the antifungal activity of crude extracts of L. nodiflora L. against the human pathogenic fungi. Crude extracts from the leaves and shoots of plant were prepared in different solvents including ethanol, methanol, ethyl acetate, chloroform and water and tested for antifungal activity against Aspergillus niger, A.. flavus, Paecilomyces varioti, Microsporum gypseum, and Trichophyton rubrum. Concentration of various elements e.g. Al, Ca, Cu, Fe, Mg, Mn, P, S and Zn were determined by using atomic absorption spectrophotometer and UV spectrophotometer. All crude extracts including ethanol, methanol, ethyl acetate, chloroform and aqueous extracts showed high activity against test organisms. Ethanol and aqueous extracts appeared to be the most effective antifungal agents as compared to methanol, chloroform and ethyl acetate. Moreover, the plant L. nodiflora L has high concentration of various essential elements. The medicinal plant Lippia nodiflora L contains considerable amount of elements which are important component of many formulation, used in skin care

Study of serum magnesium and its correlations in diabetes mellitus

Fasting concentrations of magnesium and related parameters were measured in 90 diabetic patients categorized into insulin treated [34], non-insulin treated [40] and untreated diabetics [16]. Compared with age and weight matched 40 control groups, serum concentrations of magnesium were significantly lower in untreated [p <.02] and overall diabetic patients [p < 0.05]. The concentration was the lowest in the insulin-treated group [p< 0.01]. There was significant increase in the values of urine magnesium/day in non-insulin treated [p < 0.02] and overall diabetics [p < 0.02] as compared to controls. Maximum urinary loss of magnesium [7.4 mEq/day, p <0.01] was found in patients of untreated diabetes mellitus. In all diabetics, serum magnesium concentrations were inversely related to serum glucose values [r = -0.61, p < 0.02] and in non-insulin treated and overall diabetics to insulin concentration [r = -0.21, p < 0.05 and r = -0.19, p < 0.05 respectively]. There was again a negative correlation of serum magnesium with glycosylated hemoglobin [HbAlc] in insulin treated [r= -0.61, p< 0.02] and overall diabetics [r = -0.45, p < 0.02]. Serum magnesium positively correlated with age [r = 0.36, p<0.02] and inversely related with ketone bodies [r=-0.28, p < 0.05] when results for all groups of diabetics were pooled