ABSTRACT

Sarcophrynium brachystachys also known as the praying plant, is traditionally used for food  packaging. Ethanol 96 % was used to percolate the air dried and pulverized leave sample   in order to obtain the crude extract. First phase of partitioning was carried out with the crude extract using chloroform 99.5% and distilled water as solvents, to obtain the chloroform and water extracts respectively. In the second phase, the chloroform extract was partitioned using methanol 99.5% and n-hexane 99.5% to obtain the methanolic and n-hexane extracts respectively. Column chromatography of the chloroform/ methanolic extracts was performed and TLC carried out afterwards, to isolate the pure compounds, JSO4 and JSO5. The pure isolates were characterized based on  1H and 13C NMR spectra, DEPT-135, GC-MS spectrometry, COSY and HSQC spectra.  JSO4, a yellow golden oil was isolated and characterized as a tertiary substituted amine with a suggested name as 5-(2-(sec-butyl)phenoxy-N-(1-ethoxypropyl)-6-(2-isobuthyl-2,3-dimethylcyclopropoxy)-N-methyldec-1-ene amine, with a molecular mass of 533 and molecular formulae of  C35H61NO3. JSO5 a light green oil, was also isolated and characterized  as a tertiary substituted amine with a suggested name as (E)-N-(1-(3-(8-(3,5-dimethylhexane-3-yl)-3-(3-ethyl-4-methoxypent-3-en-1-yl)-2,3-dihydrobenzol[b][1,4]dioxin-2-yl)propoxypropyl-N-O-dimethylhydroxylamine with a molecular formulae of C32H55NO5 and with molecular mass of 543 and to the best of our knowledge, it is the first time these two compounds has been reported.  Phytochemical analysis of the crude extract showed the presence of secondary metabolites such as alkaloid, flavonoid, saponin, terpenes cardiac glycosides, steroid, and phenolic glycosides. Qualitatively, alkaloid and flavonoid were found to be present in high amount while saponin appeared to be present in moderate quantity. Terpenes, steroid, cardiac and phenolic glycosides were seen to be present in minute quantities. The quantitative analysis result was found to follow the order; alkaloid (6.68 ±0.56) ˃ flavonoid (5.51±0.33) ˃ saponin (4.28±0.16) ˃ tannin (1.04±0.02) ˃terpenes (0.91±0.02) all in mg/100 g of the sample. Acute toxicity of the crude extract was performed and the result showed that the lethal dose that could kill 50 % of the population (LD50) is equal to zero meaning that the leaves of the plant does not contain any toxic substance. Antibacterial screening of the different partitioned extracts revealed that the methanolic extract had the widest zone of inhibition of 15 mm ±1.23/1000 µg disc on Staphylococcus aureus and 12 mm ±1.03/ 1000 µg disc for Escherichia coli and 13 mm±1.03/50 µg disc for Pseudomonas aeruginosa  against the control sample of streptomycin  which inhibited the bacterial isolates at 22 mm ±0.00/1000 µg disc for Staphylococcus aureus, 15 mm ±0.00/100 µg disc for Echerichia coli and 16 mm ±/10 µg disc for Pseudomonas aeruginosa.