Antioxidant, Cytotoxic, Antibacterial, and Anthelmintic Investigations of bark and leaves of Litsea glutinosa

Bangladeshi medicinal plants have received considerable attention for their bioactivity in traditional medical systems. The present study was aimed to investigate the comparative phytochemical screening and pharmacological importance of crude ethanolic extracts of leaves and bark of Litsea glutinosa. In DPPH radical-scavenging assay, bark extract showed highest IC50 value at 17.49 µg/mL whereas leaves showed at 76.75 µg/mL. The total phenolic, flavonoids, and tannin content in bark showed 277.73, 38.31, and 78.7 mg/gm of its dried extract respectively with regards to standards equivalent, whereas for leaves these were 53.87, 19.41, and 17.11 mg/gm of its dried extract. Both the extracts of leaves and bark showed strong reducing power. In cytotoxic activity test on brine shrimp lethality bioassy, the LC50 values for bark and leaves extracts were 34.67 and 67.61µg/ml respectively. In antibacterial activity assay, the bark showed activity against eight tested bacterial species except S. sonni and it showed highest activity against S. aureus. Whereas the leaves extract showed activity against seven tested bacterial species except S. epidermidis and S. sonni and it showed highest activity against S. dysentery. In the anthelmintic activity test on H. contortus the bark extract showed paralysis and death time of 31.23 and 42.27 min respectively whereas leaves extract showed these time of 33.85 and 42.27 min respectively at a concentration on 100 mg/mL. The results demonstrated that the ethanolic extract of L. glutinosa bark has more potential antioxidant, cytotoxic and anthelmintic activity than that of leaves.