Phytochemical Screening of Ethanolic Extract of Annona muricata (Soursop) leave

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ABSTRACT

Annona muricata is an important medicinal plant. The present study deals with the analysis of phytochemical constituents by qualitative and quantitative analysis of Annona muricata leave using ethanol as the solvent. Phytochemical compounds such as alkaloids, flavonoids, saponins tannins, reducing sugar, ascorbic acid were determined. Quantitative analysis was also conducted to determine the amount of the bioactive compounds present. Alkaloids (2.34  0.01%), Flavonoids (5.13  0.04%), Saponins (2.53  0.25%), Tannins (0.15  0.3%), Reducing sugar (34.26  1.04%), Ascorbic acid (28.32  1.25mg /100g.

CHAPTER ONE

1.0 Introduction

Medicinal plants are plants that have similar properties as conventional pharmaceutical drugs like Cynarin, Quinine, Digoxin, Salicin, Silymarin. Human have used medicinal plants throughout history to either cure or reduce symptoms of an illness. Hippocrates (460- 377Bc), described medicinal plants as natural products and listed about 400 different plant species that have been an integral plant ancient traditional medicine. Plant like soursop have been used in the treatment of various sickness (Sofowora, 2000 ).

Traditional medicine having a long history is defined as the total sum of knowledge skills and practices based on the difference cultures used in the maintenance of health as well as in the prevention, diagnosis, improvement or treatment of physical or mental illness. Complementary medicine are used interchangeably with traditional medicine in some countries. Traditional medicine plays an important role in health care practice in different countries (Soforowa, 2000).

Herbal medicine refers to the use of herbs, herbal material, herbal preparations and finished herbal products that contains parts or whole of plants material as active ingredient (WHO, 2008). Herbs are used to maintain health and to prevent, alleviate or cure diseases. Herbal medicines are used in all societies and is common to all culture. Herbal medicine is increasingly being validated by scientific investigations which seeks to understand the active chemistry of the plants in the past years, chemists and pharmacist have been extracting the active compounds from plants in order to produce a reliable pharmaceutical drug.

Phytochemical are chemical compounds that occur naturally in plants, the word phyto means “plant” in Greek. Some are responsible for colour and other organoleptic properties such as the deep purple of blue berries and the smell of garlic. According to (Debusk and Hamish 2008) phytochemicals are naturally bioactive components found in plants that are able to cure various sickness like cancer diabetes, blood pressure e.t.c.

Annona muricata (Soursop) also known as graviola is an evergreen broad leaved whose every part is useful and has medicinal properties. Annona muricata belongs to the family annonaceae, they are mostly found in the southern part of Nigeria. It is a native of tropical America, but now wide spread in the tropics.

Annona muricata is a medicinal plants that has been used as a natural remedy for a variety of illness. Several studies by researchers demonstrated that the bark as well as the leaves has anti- hypertensive, vasodilator antispasmodic (smooth muscle relaxant) and cardio-depressant. Researchers re-verified Annona muricata reduces blood pressure. Other properties and   actions of Annona muricata documented by traditional uses include it use as anti-cancer, anti-diabetes, anti- bacteria, anti-malaria, anti-fungal and sedative. It is also believed to be a digestive stimulant, anti-viral and as an analgesic (Chukwuma, 2010).

1.1           

                      Justification

Since medicinal plants are widely used in different parts of the world to treat different ailment. It is necessary to investigate more on the parts of Annona muricata to know the bioactive compounds that have the various medicinal values.

 1.2    Aim

– To determine the phytochemical in the ethanolic extract of Annona muricata (soursop) leaves.

  1.3  Objectives

1. To extract Annona muricata (soursop) using ethanol as the solvent.

ii.To qualitatively and quantitatively determine the phytochemicals present in Annona muricata.

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