Pharmacognosy, Phytochemistry & Natural Products

Biography

Biography: Deepa Halemani

Abstract

Depression is one of the most common mental disorders, characterised by sad mood, loss of interest and pleasure, worthlessness and suicidal thoughts. Currently Tricyclic antidepressants and SSRIs are most commonly employed drugs for the treatment of depression. Synthetic drugs available for treatment of depression have various adverse effects like sedation, dry mouth, postural hypotension and tachycardia etc. Drugs obtained from natural sources are known to cause fewer side effects compared to synthetic drugs despite of same ability to cure disease. Therefore this study is undertaken to evaluate the antidepressant property of methanol extract of Aegle marmelos (AM) (an ayurvedic medicinal tree, commonly known as the bael fruit tree) leaves in mice. Methanol extract of Aegle marmelos (100mg/kg, 200mg/kg and 400mg/kg), 2% of Gum acacia (control), Imipramine 20mg/kg (standard) are administered orally to randomly divided albino mice of either sex. Antidepressant activity is assessed by Tail suspension test (TST) and Actophotometer (locomotor activity) models. In TST and Actophotometer models ANOVA with post hoc test was used to assess antidepressant activity between groups. AM of all doses (100mg/kg, 200mg/kg, 400mg/kg) have shown statistically significant decrease in immobility time (p<0.05) compared to control and results are comparable with standard in TST. In Actophotometer model AM in all the doses have shown statistically significant increase in locomotor activity (p<0.05) compared to control and results are comparable with standard.