Short reportAnthelmintic activity of Swertia chirata against gastrointestinal nematodes of sheep
Section snippets
Plant
Swertia chirata Buch-Ham. (Gentianaceae), locally named ‘chirayta’, was procured from local market (Faisalabad, Punjab–Pakistan) and authenticated in the Department of Botany, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad–Pakistan where voucher specimens are preserved.
Uses in traditional medicine
Stomachic, appetizer and anthelmintic in different recipes as ‘massaulas’ (physic drench/balls). Leaves, roots and aerial parts of S. chirata are also used for different indications [1], [2] in humans also.
Previously isolated constituents
Polyoxygenated xanthone, mangiferin, swertinin, decussarin, swerchirin, isobellidifolin [3] and chiratinin [4].
Tested material
The whole plant was shade dried, ground to powder (CP) and stored in cellophane bags until use. Aqueous and MeOH extracts were prepared from CP as previously described [5], [6].
Animals
The in vitro trial for anthelmintic activity of CAE and CME was conducted on mature live Haemonchus contortus of sheep. For in vivo studies, a total of 20 sheep of either sex (young stock ≤ 1 year), weighing 18–24 kg were selected from the animals maintained at Livestock Experiment Station, Rakh Kherewala (Punjab, Pakistan). Before the start of experiment, animals were confirmed to be naturally infected with mixed species of gastrointestinal nematodes (H. contortus, Trichostrongylus colubriformis
In vitro studies
Ten worms were exposed in triplicate to each of the following treatments in separate Petri dishes at 25–30 °C: levamisole, 0.55 mg/ml; S. chirata as CAE and CME at 25 mg/ml each and PBS. The inhibition of motility and/or mortality of the worms were observed after 0, 1, 2, 3 and 6 h intervals. Finally, the treated worms were kept for 30 min in the lukewarm fresh PBS to observe the revival of motility.
In vivo studies
Animals were randomly divided into 4 groups of five animals each and assigned to the following
Statistical analysis
The data were statistically analyzed using SAS software [10]. Results were expressed as mean ± standard error of mean (Mean ± SEM). The results were considered significant with P < 0.05.
Results and conclusions
Results are reported in Table 1, Table 2. In vitro results indicated the CME of S. chirata whole plant at 25 mg/ml inhibited almost completely the mobility of isolated worms. The same activity was observed with 0.55 mg/ml of levamisole (Table 1). The CME and CP of S. chirata showed 58.8 and 58.2% reduction in ECR in sheep at 3 g/kg on day 5 post-treatment (Table 2), respectively. CAE was least effective which resulted in 34% reduction in ECR on day 14 post-treatment. In comparison to this,
Acknowledgements
This research was funded by the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad (Pakistan) under promotion of a research programme.
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Swertia chirayita: A comprehensive review on traditional uses, phytochemistry, quality assessment and pharmacology
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2019, South African Journal of BotanyCitation Excerpt :These results demonstrated that S. chirata whole plant has moderate anthelmintic activity. The results were supported the utilization of S. chirata by farmers, in the form of crude powder in “massaulas” (physic drench/balls) in the ethnoveterinary system of Pakistan as an anthelmintic agent (Iqbal et al., 2006). This is another desirable activity of Swertia which can be exploited further based on accurate scientific data and analysis.
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2019, Experimental ParasitologyCitation Excerpt :Most of these in vitro tests have been used to detect and describe resistance against most anthelmintic groups, including benzimidazoles (Rialch et al., 2013; Ramünke et al., 2016; Milhes et al., 2017), imidazothiazoles (Martines-Valladares et al., 2013), and macrocyclic lactones (Almeida et al., 2013; Milhes et al., 2017). The same methodology has also been applied for the evaluation of the efficacy of a number of biological compounds or plant extracts in the last decades (Alawa et al., 2003; Iqbal et al., 2006; Al-Rofaai et al., 2012; Araújo et al., 2017; Jaso Díaz et al., 2017; Novobilsky et al., 2013). However, as for in vivo assessments, most of these in vitro tests are not appropriate for evaluation of ACE due to the complexity and particularities of the endogenous and exogenous lifecycle of Eimeria spp..