P Selvakumar¹ , P Satheesh kumar², K Parimala Gandhi¹, T Anupriyanka¹

Abstract

Purpose: To assess the pharmacognostic and antioxidant activities of the leaf and flower extracts of Lawsonia inermis Lythraceae. Methods: Pharmacognostic analysis involved wet and dry analyses, such as determination of total ash, extractive values, moisture content and phytochemical analysis, while antioxidant activity of plant extracts (100 - 500 μg/mL) was determined through ferric reducing antioxidant power assay. Ascorbic acid in different concentrations (100 - 500 μg/mL) was used as the standard. Apart from fluorescence studies, high-performance thin-layer chromatography (HPTLC) was used to identify novel compounds. Results: For the pharmacognostic analysis, total ash values of leaf and flowers were 5.57 ± 0.06 and 3.10 ± 0.03 %, respectively. The results indicated that the total ash value was significantly greater in the leaf than flower (p < 0.05). Low moisture content of the flower extract implied a lesser tendency of bacterial, fungal, or yeast contamination. The phytochemical evaluation revealed the presence of secondary metabolites in leaf and flower extracts of L. inermis. The greater proportion of these metabolites in the leaf extract may be ascribed to significantly higher reducing power potential (p < 0.05). Conclusion: The leaf extract possesses superior antioxidant activity compared to the flower extract of Lawsonia inermis and this could be due to the occurrence of a diversity of phytochemicals in the leaves.