Biological Activities of the Essential Oil from Erigeron floribundus

Abstract

Erigeron floribundus (Asteraceae) is an herbaceous plant widely used in Cameroonian traditional medicine to treat various diseases of microbial and non-microbial origin. In the present study, we evaluated the in vitro biological activities displayed by the essential oil obtained from the aerial parts of E. floribundus, namely the antioxidant, antimicrobial and antiproliferative activities. Moreover, we investigated the inhibitory effects of E. floribundus essential oil on nicotinate mononucleotide adenylyltransferase (NadD), a promising new target for developing novel antibiotics, and Trypanosoma brucei, the protozoan parasite responsible for Human African trypanosomiasis. The essential oil composition was dominated by spathulenol (12.2%), caryophyllene oxide (12.4%) and limonene (8.8%). The E. floribundus oil showed a good activity against Staphylococcus aureus (inhibition zone diameter, IZD of 14 mm, minimum inhibitory concentration, MIC of 512 µg/mL). Interestingly, it inhibited the NadD enzyme from S. aureus (IC 50 of 98 µg/mL), with no effects on mammalian orthologue enzymes. In addition, T. brucei proliferation was inhibited with IC 50 values of 33.5 µg/mL with the essential oil and 5.6 µg/mL with the active component limonene. The essential oil exhibited strong cytotoxicity on HCT 116 colon carcinoma cells with an IC 50 value of 14.89 µg/mL, and remarkable ferric reducing antioxidant power (tocopherol-equivalent antioxidant capacity, TEAC = 411.9 µmol·TE/g).

Trypanosoma brucei Inhibition by Essential Oils from Medicinal and Aromatic Plants Traditionally Used in Cameroon (Azadirachta indica, Aframomum melegueta, Aframomum daniellii, Clausena anisata, Dichrostachys cinerea and Echinops giganteus)

“…The toxicity of monoterpene hydrocarbons against T. brucei can be attributed to the high hydrophobicity of this class of compounds, which are able to easily cross the cell membrane, causing the destabilization of phospholipid bilayers and the alteration of their permeability, leading to cell damage and death [ 44 , 55 ]. Among these compounds, the most abundant was sabinene (43.9%) ( Figure 1 ) which showed an IC 50 value against T. brucei of 5.96 µg/mL, which is close to that of the African cardamom essential oil (7.65 µg/mL) ( Table 2 ).…”

“…The cell culture conditions and the growth inhibition assay on T. brucei and Balb/3T3 cells were performed as described before [ 44 ]. T. brucei TC221 bloodstream forms and mouse embryonic fibroblast Balb/3T3 cells (ATCC no CCL-163) were cultivated in vented plastic flasks at 37 °C with 5% CO 2 .…”

Functional Characterization of TvCyt2, a Member of the p450 Monooxygenases From Trichoderma virens Relevant During the Association With Plants and Mycoparasitism

“…Several studies have demonstrated the properties of sesquiterpenes; their oxygenated forms have a wide spectrum of biological activities, participating as inducers of plant defense mechanisms as well as important antimicrobial properties. This activity has been related with the presence of one or both an unsaturated double bond or oxygen-containing functional group (Kramer and Abraham 2012;Petrelli et al 2016;Wu et al 2005). In plant-microbe associations, sesquiterpenes are crucial for the establishment of the interaction, an example is when Laccaria bicolor interacts with Populus or Arabidopsis plants (Ditengou et al 2015), highlighting the relevance of secondary metabolites in biological interactions.…”

Chemical composition and evaluation of the antibacterial and Cytotoxic activities of the essential oil from the leaves of Myracrodruon urundeuva

“…However, some essential oils extracted from other plants exert weaker antimicrobial activity against the bacteria tested herein because of weaker inhibition of bacterial growth, higher MIC values, or a demonstrated bacterial resistance [ 60 – 68 ]. These results, when compared with those obtained in the present study, reveal the more promising antibacterial power of M. urundeuva essential oil, likely because it contains specific active components.…”