Phytochemical constituents and antibacterial activity of some green leafy vegetables

To investigate the antibacterial activity and photochemicals of five green leafy vegetables against a panel of five bacteria strains.

Disc diffusion method was used to determine the antibacterial activity, while kanamycin was used as a reference antibiotic. The phytochemical screening of the extracts was performed using standard methods.

All methanol extracts were found active against all the test bacterial strains. Overall maximum extracts shows antibacterial activity which range from 6 to 15 mm. Proteins and carbohydrates was found in all the green leaves, whereas alkaloid, steroids, saponins, flavonoids, tannins were found in most of the test samples.

The obtain result suggests that green leafy vegetables have moderate antibacterial activity and contain various pharmacologically active compounds and thus provide the scientific basis for the traditional uses of the studied vegetables in the treatment of bacterial infections.