Abstract:
Medicinal plants have been used for centuries to heal, long before the discovery of
modern medicine. With the progress of pharmacology, these plants have served as models for
the synthesis of numerous drugs due to their availability in nature. A major part of current
research focuses on the study of original antioxidant and anti-radical molecules of natural
origin.
In this regard, our work focuses on the phytochemical and biological study of two plants
collected in Algeria: Spartium junceum of the Fabaceae family and Convolvulus tricolor of the
Convolvulaceae family.
Our study begins with the extraction of the essential oil from the flowers of Spartium
junceum by hydrodistillation and hydroalcoholic maceration of the aerial parts of Convolvulus
tricolor, followed by extraction with solvents of increasing polarity, resulting in three extracts
(ethyl acetate, n-butanol and dichloromethane) of this species. The essential oil and extracts are
then subjected to quantitative analyses of polyphenolic compounds as well as flavonoids and
the evaluation of antioxidant activity by four methods (DPPH, ABTS, phenantroline, FRAP).
Test results showed that the ethyl acetate and n-butanol extracts have strong antioxidant
properties, unlike the essential oil, which showed low antioxidant activity.
Furthermore, a study of antibacterial activity by the disk diffusion method demonstrated
that the extracts with ethyl acetate and dichloromethane have powerful antibacterial properties
against gram-positive strains, unlike the essential oil, which showed no antibacterial activity.
Additionally, a study of antifungal activity demonstrated that all three extracts exhibit
strong antifungal activity at low concentrations.
Finally, GC-MS analysis of the essential oil of the S. junceum plant identified 46
compounds, representing 74.784% of the essential oil.
