COMPARATIVE IN-VITRO BIOLOGICAL STUDY OF AERIAL PARTS OF PLANT HAMELIA PATENS

Background: The plant Hamelia patens belong to a family Rubiaceae, which is rich in active phytochemicals like flavonoids and alkaloids. Although Plant has been traditionally used for the treatment of various ailments still no systematic pharmacognostical, phytochemical and pharmacological work has ever been carried out on this potential plant. Aim: The present study was carried out for the standardization and determination of in vitro antioxidant activity of the aqueous and methanolic extracts of aerial parts of plant Hamelia patens. Method: After the determination of all the standardization parameter, preliminary phytochemical analysis was done following various qualitative procedures for the determination of alkaloids, flavonoids, etc. Quantitative phytochemical analysis was performed for the determination of total phenolics by Folin-Ciocalteu method, total flavonoid by Aluminium chloride colorimetric assay and in-vitro antioxidant properties were evaluated by DPPH, ABTS and FRAP method. Result: Phytochemical analysis revealed the presence of various phytoconstituents like alkaloids, flavonoids etc. The highest amount of phenolic was found in the methanolic stem extract i.e. 236.22 mg of GA/g of extract while highest flavonoid content was found in methanolic leaf extract i.e. 331.54mg of RU/g of extract. Methanolic leaf and stem extract and aqueous leaf extract showed antioxidant potential equivalent to standard by DPPH, ABTS and FRAP method respectively. Conclusion: The study concludes that plant Hamelia patens is a rich source of phenols and flavonoids, and also showed good in-vitro antioxidant activity by all three methods. Thus, the plant Hamelia patens can be explored as a potential source of natural antioxidant