Determination of Antiemetic, Antimicrobial, Anti-Radical and Cytotoxic Activity of Methanolic Extracts of Centella asiatica

This study was conducted to investigate the antiemetic, antimicrobial, antioxidant and cytotoxic activity of methanolic extracts of Centella asiatica . The antiemetic assay was carried out by using chick emetic model with minor modifications by calculating the mean decrease in the number of retching. The antimicrobial activity of the crude extract was performed by Disc Diffusion method. The anti-radical activity was determined by the 2,2-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl hydrate (DPPH) method. Brine shrimp lethality bioassay is done to determine cytotoxic activity. The anti-emetic activity of Centella asiatica leaves on young chicks revealed that these extracts have a less anti-emetic effect. The group of chicks treated with Chlorpromazine was found to have 38.4 retches as compared to the 60.4 retches of the control group, thus Chlorpromazine reduced the retches by 36.96%. The chickens treated with leaves extracts inhibited the retches up to 15.67%. The manimum antimicrobial effect was found in this methanol crude extract. The extract did not appear potent in terms of both zones of inhibition and spectrum of activity. In anti-radical activity test, the extract showed moderate free radical scavenging activity with IC50 value 241.71 μg/ml. while compared to that of the reference standard ascorbic acid. Moreover, the methanolic crude extracts also possess moderate cytotoxic principles potential (LC50 value of 39.06 μg/ml) comparing with that of standard vincristine (0.839 μg/ml).