Phytochemical and antibacterial studies of Cissus ibuensis

Cissus ibuensis L.Hook, family Vitaceae, is a climber found in tropical countries including Nigeria. The plant is used in folkloric medicine of Northern Nigeria to treat bacterial infections and also to relieve pain and inflammation [1]. In our continuing search for bioactive plant metabolites from Nigerian medicinal plants, the aerial parts of Cissus ibuensis was investigated. The acetone and the ethanol extracts at concentration of 5 and 10mg/ml were screened for preliminary antibacterial activity against the test organisms: Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa using agar diffusion assay [2]. The results showed that the ethanol extract was more active. This extract was suspended in water and partitioned with ethylacetate and N-butanol and the antibacterial studies showed that the N-butanol extract was more active against all the test pathogens with zones of inhibition ranging from 15mm to 18mm at 5mg/ml comparable to the standard antibiotics gentamycin (10µg/ml and ciprofloxacin 10µg/ml).

Fractionation of this extract by flash column chromatography, gel filteration over Sephadex LH-20 and preparative thin layer chromatography afforded the flavonoids: kaempferol, kaempferol-3-O-rutinoside, quercetin-3-O-rutinoside and kaempferol 3-O-galactoside. The structures were elucidated by NMR spectroscopy and compared with literature [3]. The observed antibacterial activity might justify the folkloric use of this plant.

References: [1] Dalziel, J.M (1965) The useful plants of West tropical Africa. A Crown agent for oversea publication.

[2] Mendoza, L. et al. (1997)J .Ethnopharmacol. 58:85–88.

[3] Mabry, T.J. and Markham, K.R (1968) Systematic identification of Flavonoids.