Antimicrobial and Antioxidant Efficacy of Spice Extracts and Their Application against Common Foodborne Pathogens

The study aimed to investigate the potential antioxidant and antimicrobial properties of four spice extracts against five common foodborne pathogens.

The antimicrobial and antioxidant efficacy of four spice extracts from Zingiber officinales, Syzygium aromaticum, Cuminum cyminum and Origanum vulgare were examined against five foodborne pathogens. Listeria monocytogenes, Bacillus cereus, Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa using disc diffusion technique. The respective five pathogenic strains were tested against the antibiotic Gentamycin (5 mg) as a control.

From the study, it was found that Z. officinales, S. aromaticum, C. cyminum and O. vulgare extracts were found potentially active with diverse efficiency against the five respective bacterial strains at a standard concentration of 10 mg/mL while the extract of C. cyminum was only most effective against L. monocytogenes. Whereas E. coli and B. cereus were found resistant to Z. officinales and C. cyminum. The Z. officinales inhibited the bacterial growth with the MIC at 2.50 mg/mL but other extracts showed an alike response at 5.0 mg/mL. However, the spice extracts showed highly durable bacteriostatic activities against the strains of foodborne pathogens with MIC ranging from 2.5 to 15.0 mg/mL.