Antibacterial potential of the phenolics extracted from the Paulownia tomentosa L. leaves as studied with use of high-performance thin-layer chromatography combined with direct bioautography

AbstractPaulownia tomentosa (Thunb.) Steud. is a medicinal plant with a very long established and considerable position in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and in those of the other Far East Asian countries (mainly in Vietnam, Laos, Japan, and Korea). In Europe, Americas and Australia, P. tomentosa is known as princess tree, empress tree, or foxglove tree, and it is cultivated as a beautifully blossoming ornamental tree. In TCM, all parts of P. tomentosa (i.e., timber, bark, leaves, flowers and fruits) are used for curative purposes. From a literature survey, a conclusion can be drawn that in phytochemical and ethnopharmaceutical studies relatively less attention has been paid to investigating the chemical composition and biological activity of the leaves than that of the other parts of this medicinal plant and for this reason, our research was focused on antibacterial properties of the phenolics extracted from the P. tomentosa leaves. There are two important novelties of our approach. One novelty is th...