Acetyleugenol is a phytochemical compound with broad effects against infectious diseases and tumors. Here, we extracted, characterized, and elucidated the structure of acetyeugenol, for the first time, from the leaves of Acacia nilotica (L.)—a well-known medicinal plant. The broad antibacterial potential of acetyleugenol was first confirmed against seven bacterial clinical isolates, which reveal a strong activity against Proteus sp., Salmonella typhi, Staphylococcus aureus, and Streptococcus pneumonia with similar or better zone of inhibition comparing to that of the control amoxicillin. To further investigate its effect against Mycobacterium tuberculosis, acetyleugenol and its indole and phenyl analogues were subjected to molecular docking experiments against two potential tuberculosis drug targets—MtPknE and MtPknB Ser/Thr protein kinases. The results reveal that all of the analogs have improved docking scores compared to the acetyleugenol. The indole analogues EUG-1 and EUG-3 were more effective with better docking scores for MtPknE with −11.08 and −10.05 kcal/mol, respectively. Similar results were obtained for the MtPknB. In contrast, only the EUG-2 phenyl analogue has given rise to similar docking scores for both targets. This opens the door for further comprehensive studies on these acetyleugenol analogues with in vitro and in vivo experiments to validate and get more insights into their mechanisms of action.

Infections caused by bacteria continue to be a major threat to public health. The impact of this is especially alarming in developing countries due to the relative shortages of medicines and the emergence of widespread drug resistance. This has led to the search for new antimicrobial agents mainly among plant extracts. As part of an ongoing research to isolate and purify antibacterial compounds from the extract of traditionally used medicinal plants from Kebbi State, Nigeria, some selected plants were screened for their antibacterial potentials. The preliminary phytochemical screening of the extracts was carried out using standard methods. The bioactivity (antibacterial) test was done using agar well diffusion method, while MIC and MBC were tested using broth dilution method. The results for the phytochemical screening showed the presence of flavonoids, tannins, saponins, glycosides, alkaloids and terpenoids in the selected plants extracts. The results for the antibacterial activity of the crude methanolic extracts of the selected plants showed varying degree of antibacterial activities against selected bacterial isolates. However, the stem bark extract of Acacia nilotica showed relatively high zone of inhibition (mm), minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC). The extract was found to inhibit the growth of most of the tested bacterial isolates comprising of both Gram-positive and Gram-negative organisms. These findings support previous reports on the antimicrobial activity of this plant. The result of the present study signifies the potential of Acacia nilotica stem bark as a source of therapeutic agents, which may provide leads in the ongoing search for antibacterial agents from plants.

Acetyleugenol is a phytochemical compound with broad effect against infectious diseases and tumors. Here, we extracted, characterized and elucidated the structure of acetyeugenol, for the first time, from the leaves of Acacia nilotica (L.)―a well-known medicinal plant. The broad antibacterial potential of acetyleugenol was first confirmed against seven bacterial pathogenic isolates with best activity against Proteus sp., Salmonella typhi, Staphylococcu aureus, and Streptococcus pneumonia, which showed similar or better zone of inhibition to that of the control amoxicillin. To further investigate its effect against Mycobacterium tuberculosis, acetyleugenol and its indole and phenyl analogs were subjected to molecular docking experiments against two potential tuberculosis drug targets―MtPknE and MtPknB Ser/Thr protein kinases. The results reveal that all of the analogs have improved docking scores comparing to the acetyleugenol. The indole analogs EUG-1 and EUG-3 were more effective with better docking scores for MtPknE with –11.08 and –10.05 kcal/mol, respectively. Similar results were obtained for the MtPknB. In contrast, only the EUG-2 phenyl analog has given rise to similar docking scores for both targets. This opens the door for further comprehensive studies on these acetyleugenol analogs with in vitro and in vivo experiments to validate and get more insights into their mechanisms of action.

Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a major public health problem worldwide, herbal derivatives have proved to be more efficient in the treatment of diabetes over synthetic drugs because of less side effects and adverse effects. The aim of this article is to investigate the phytochemical constituent, acute toxicity and hypoglycemic potential of Dichrostachys cinerea methanol leaf extract. Standard laboratory protocols were employed for phytochemical assay, fixed dose method was used to determine acute toxicity (LD50). Alloxan was used to induce diabetes to experimental animals and fasting blood levels were recorded weekly using glucometer. Phytochemical analysis revealed the presence of numerous phytoconstituents. The result for acute toxicity of D. cinerea methanol leaf extract (DCME) showed that the LD50 is above 5000mg/kg. The body weight showed that there were no significant (P>0.05) difference in untreated control, standard control, DCME100mg/kg, DCME200mg/kg, DCME 400mg/kg and normal control initially. At week 1, 2 and 3, only group treated with standard drug and extract significantly (P<0.05) increases compared to both normal and untreated control. Before extract and standard drug administration (week 0), the fasting blood sugar of all the alloxan diabetes induced groups (i.e group 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6) significantly (P0.05) difference between, extract treated groups compared to standard control. The present study revealed that D. cinerea methanol leaf extract contain numerous phytochemicals and the extract is practically not toxic at acute dose, and with strong glucose lowering potentials.