Antibacterial activity of aqueous and ethanolic extracts of garlic, cinnamon and turmeric against escherichia coli ATCC 25922 and bacillus subtilis DSM 3256.

ABSTRACT

Many of the spices used daily have been documented to be antimicrobial and have medicinal value as well. Most bacteria are sensitive to the extracts from plants such as clove, garlic, mustard, onion, oregano, turmeric etc. spices such as garlic turmeric and cinnamon has been used as antimicrobial agents in their raw form for the treatment of wounds and injuries and joint pains etc. The present study was conducted to investigate the antibacterial activity of garlic, cinnamon and turmeric. Different concentrations of extracts were prepared by using two solvents water and ethanol. The antibacterial activity was tested against Bacillus subtilus (DSM 3256) and E.coli (ATCC 25922) at different concentration of extracts of spices by using disc diffusion method. According to the results among the selected spices garlic had the best inhibitory activity showing maximum zone of 26mm against Bacillus subtilis DSM and a zone of 22mm against E.coli ATCC 25922. The aqueous extracts of garlic were more effective than ethanolic extract. In the case of cinnamon and turmeric, the ethanolic extracts were more effective exhibiting zones of 16mm against B.subtilis DSM 3256 and 17mm against E.coli , which showed that the cinnamon ethanolic extracts are equally effective against both Gram negative and Gram positive bacteria. The widest zones formed by ethanolic extract of turmeric against B.subtilis was measured as 14mm and it was 11mm for E.coli ATCC 25922. The results showed that B.subtilus is more susceptible to test spices as compared to E.coli.