Peppermint ( Mentha piperita) inhibits microbial biofilms in vitro
Microbial biofilms have become increasingly problematic in the food processing and medical industries where they cause food and surface contamination. Biofilms have also been implicated as the cause of serious infections in humans as their occurrence makes it difficult to treat common infections and...
Saved in:
Published in | South African journal of botany Vol. 77; no. 1; pp. 80 - 85 |
---|---|
Main Authors | , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Elsevier B.V
2011
|
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
Cover
Loading…
Summary: | Microbial biofilms have become increasingly problematic in the food processing and medical industries where they cause food and surface contamination. Biofilms have also been implicated as the cause of serious infections in humans as their occurrence makes it difficult to treat common infections and the likelihood of recurrent infections is high. Due to emerging resistance, conventional control methods are fast becoming ineffective. In this study, the use of a selection of commercial plant extracts is investigated. The inhibitory effects of eight herbal extracts on the development of microbial biofilms was investigated against clinical and reference strains of
Pseudomonas aeruginosa and
Candida albicans. The antimicrobial activity was investigated on the planktonic forms using the minimum inhibitory concentration assay. The extracts that showed the highest antimicrobial activity against the two test organisms were
Echinacea angustifolia (cone flower),
Mentha piperita (peppermint) and
Rosmarinus officinalis (rosemary) with minimum inhibitory concentration values between 0.38 and 2.5
mg/ml. The crystal violet assay was used to assess the effect of pre-treating a surface with plant extracts on cell attachment and the extent of biofilm development following exposure to extracts (biofilm biomass). Most of the extracts reduced microbial colonization by at least 50%. In contrast, preformed biofilms were less responsive to the majority of extracts, thus growth inhibition was more difficult to achieve.
Mentha piperita was the only extract that showed some antibiofilm activity against both pathogens. |
---|---|
Bibliography: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.sajb.2010.05.011 ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 0254-6299 1727-9321 |
DOI: | 10.1016/j.sajb.2010.05.011 |