A survey of ethnomedicinal plants of Darjeeling hills for their antimicrobial and antioxidant activities

The aims of this study were to document ethnomedicinal knowledge of the tribes of Darjeeling hills and evaluate antimicrobial and antioxidant activities among the sampled plants. The study reports 78 plant species (47 families and 70 genera) from the three hilly sub-divisions of Darjeeling district. For antimicrobial evaluation, disc diffusion assay was used against a panel of 11 microorganisms (6 Gram positive bacteria species, 1 Gram negative bacteria species, 2 yeast species and 2 mould species). Antioxidant potential of the plants was investigated by assaying their total phenol content, total flavonoid content, DPPH ^., ^.OH and ABTS ^.+-scavenging activities, reducing power, metal-chelating activity and anti-lipid peroxidation activity. For statistical analysis, Pearson's Chi Square test was used. Both PRTAU (plants with reports of traditional antimicrobial use) (40.3%) and PNRTAU (plants with no reports of traditional antimicrobial use) were equally active against the microorganisms tested. The χ ² - test confirms that statistically there is a difference in count of PRTAU versus PNRTAU plants in different activity groups, indicating PRTAU plants have higher (P<0.05) probability (71.4% for PRTAU against 35.3% for PNRTAU) of showing lower MIC values than PNRTAU plants. In both the groups, plants displayed good antioxidant activities.