A Study of Antibacterial Activity of Cidar (Zizyphus spinachristi L.) on Bacterial Pathogens isolated from Skin Infections

Abstract

Zizyphus spina-christi is a scientific name of a plant where its common name is Nabaq in Iraq. All parts of this plant are used by local Arab people to help maintain a healthy lifestyle. In this report, it was found that the aqueous and methanolic extracts of leaves and seeds of Zizyphus spina-christi has inhibitory
effects at various concentrations (25, 50, 100, and 200 mg/ml) against five bacterial species Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa , E. coli , Acinetobacter spp. ,and Enterococcus spp. isolated from skin lesions. The 25 mg/ml concentration had no effects at all on all bacterial species tested. The
highest activity (17.67 mm) recorded was for leaves aqueous extract against Staphylococcus aureus, while the lowest activity ( 7.33 mm ) was obtained for
leaves aqueous extract against Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The leaves aqueous and methanolic extracts had better antimicrobial activities than seed equeous and methanolic extracts. Our results support, at least in part, the use of all parts of Zizyphus spina-christi plant as a natural antimicrobial agent in developing new drugs for treating infectious diseases in human.