Bacterial contamination of some medicinal plant materials sold at Omdurman local market, Khartoum state, Central Sudan

By: Ihsan Mosa Ewad EL-Kareem, Hatil Hashim EL-Kamali, Ahlam Salih Eltahir

Key Words: Bacterial contamination, Medicinal plants, Omdurman market, Central Sudan

Int. J. Micro. Myco. 6(3), 1-7, September 2017.

Certification: ijmm 2017 0008 [Generate Certificate]

Abstract

Plants have long been used as herbal medicines in many countries. However, microbial contamination of these medicines may affect human health. In the present study fifteen medicinal plants namely, Acacia nilotica ssp. nilotica, Trigonella foenum-greacum, Nigella sativa, Hyphaene thebaica, Nauclea latifola, Cyperus rotundus, Cymbopogon schoenanthus spp, proximus, Artemisia herba-alb, Cassia acutifolia, Solenostemma argel, Tamarindus indica, Ziziphus spina-christi, Lepidium sativum, Foeniculum vulgare and Coriandrum sativum were evaluated for bacterial contamination. The identified bacterial isolates consists of fifteen bacterial species, the most dominant bacteria were Leuconostoc pseudomes enteriodes, Sphingomonas paucimobilis and Staphylococcus lentus. The highest total bacterial load was 53×105 cfu/g found in Coriandrum sativum exceeded maximum acceptable contamination limits set by the WHO (i.e 105 to ≤ 107 cfu/g. The levels of contamination varied greatly between the commercially available plant samples investigated.