Abstract:
Medicinal plants are used to produce new antimicrobial drugs due to increased bacterial resistance of antibiotics. The plant Pedilanthus tithymaloides said to possesses the wide range of medicinal properties which were confirmed through previous studies. The present study was to determine its antimicrobial activity using its leaves extract and also analysing whether their phytochemical constituents are responsible for its anti-microbial activities. Pedilanthus tithymaloides leaves extract was obtained and tested for antimicrobial activities and analysed for the presence of chemical constituents by preliminary phytochemical analysis and by FTIR analysis. The antimicrobial susceptibility studies were conducted against gram (-) bacteria such as Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and gram (+) bacteria such as Staphylococcus aureus. The current result supports the medicinal use of the leaf which acts as an antimicrobial agent. However further studies are needed to isolate the active compound from the leaf and to study the antimicrobial activity of that active compound.
