Antioxidant Activity and Antimicrobial Property of Some Indian Spices

Theaimof the study was to assess the antioxidant and antimicrobial activity andto determine the Minimum Inhibitory Concentration (MIC) of various spice extract on some bacterial strains. The antioxidant activity was measuredin termsof DPPH, FRAP, TPC and tannin content. Aqueous and ethanolic extracts of carom seeds (83.86%) and nutmeg (94.55%) showed higher DPPH activity as compared to asafoetida and mace. The ferric reducing power was higher in ethanolic extract of carom seeds (33.41%) and mace (26.29%). Ethanolic extract of asafoetida contained the highest amount of total phenolic content (36.52 mg/ml) followed by carom seeds, nutmeg and mace. The antimicrobial activity of alcoholic and aqueous extracts of asafoetida, carom seeds, nutmeg and mace was tested against E. coli, S. aureus, Salmonella enterica and Shigella flexeneri by agar well diffusion method. The crude extract showed a broad spectrum of antimicrobial activity by inhibiting all the strains of bacteria. Agarwell diffusion assay forantimicrobial activity yielded the inhibitory zone of 5 to 15 mm diameter for asafoetida, 7 to 16 mmdiameter for carom seeds, 4 to 14 mm diameter for nutmeg and 5 to 15 mm for mace extracts. The MIC value ranged between >50mg/ml to 5 mg/ml.