POTENTIAL ANTIMICROBIAL AND ANTIMUTAGENIC ACTIVITIES OF Astragalus flavescens

Medicinal plants are very important for therapeutical usage. Astragalus species and their extracts have been used for alternative therapy. In this study, it was aimed to describe the antimicrobial and antimutagenic activities of Astragalus flavescens, (Boissier) that was collected from Afyonkarahisar, Turkey. Plant material was extracted with acetone and methanol solvents. The antimicrobial activity of the extracts was then assessed using the disc diffusion method against 10 bacteria. Ten test microorganisms were used, namely, Escherichia coli (ATCC 25992), Enterecoccus fecalis (ATCC 29212), Salmonella typhimurium (NRRLB-4420), Bacillus subtilis (NRS-744), Proteus vulgaris, Micrococcus luteus, Listeria monocyto genes (ATCC 7644), Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Bacillus cereus (ATCC 11778), and Yersinia. The highest inhibition zone obtained from the extracts was 13 mm. All extracts were found to be not vigorously efficient as antimicrobial agents when compared with the positive control group (amikacin) results. For antimutagenic activity, by using Ames/Salmonella microsome test system, A. flavescens have been evaluated whether to have antimutagenic activities or not. Antimutagenicity of acetone and methanol extracts of dried A. flavescens was determined against four direct acting mutagens, sodium azide (SA) and 2-aminoanthracene (2-AA) in TA100 strain and 4-nitro-o-phenylenediamine (NPD) and 2-aminofluorene (2-AF) in TA98 strain of Salmonella typhimurium. No inhibitory effect was observed in any of the strains and against any of the test mutagens with both extracts.