EVALUATION OF ANTIDIARRHOEAL AND INSECTICIDAL ACTIVITIES OF ETHANOL EXTRACT AND ITS FRACTIONS OF DENDROPHTHOE FALCATA (L.) LEAVES

Dendrophthoe falcata L. is an important folk medicinal plant for its medicinal uses against different types of diseases. Therefore the present study was designed to investigate the antidiarrhoeal and insecticidal activities of aqueous, ethanol, chloroform and petroleum ether fractions of D. falcata leaves. Antidiarrhoeal activities of these extracts were evaluated in Swiss albino mice by three different approaches: (i) castor oil–induced diarrhea, (ii) castor oil–induced enteropooling and (iii) activated charcoal induced small intestinal transit. Three doses of the leaf extracts (50, 100 and 200 mg/kg.p.o.) and standard drug loperamide (5mg/kg.p.o.) were used to conduct the research which showed a significant (P<0.001) reduction in the severity and frequency of diarrhea (total number and weight of stools), the volume and weight of intestinal content, as well as intestinal transit compared to control group at dose-dependent manner. Ethanol extract exhibited maximum inhibition (83.47%) among the four fractions, which are slightly less than loperamide (89.23%) whereas aqueous fraction produced the lowest inhibition (50.95%). The insecticidal activity of these extracts was investigated by the film residue method against Sitophilus oryzae L. In the insecticidal activity, the result showed that four fractions of D. falcata leave exhibited strong to moderate toxicity in concentration-dependent fashion on the insect. Among the extracts, ethanol fraction showed maximum mortalityt.