PRELIMINARY ASSESSMENT ON THE ANTI-FUNGAL PROPERTIES OF CALOTROPHIS PROCERA

ABSTRACT Calotropis procera belongs to family Asclepiadaceae. The whole plant has a strong odour and found to be growing in all rural areas. Medicinal properties of this plant are antiseptic, anti-inflammatory, analgesic and useful in eczema and also for thrush and in mycotic enteritis (H. Misra et al., 1972). Due to increasing no. of immuno compromised individuals, fungal infections have increased in the last two decades, affecting million of people worldwide (Wong et al, 1994). Among them, skin fungal infections are very difficult to eradicate (Weitzman et al, 1995). They produce a variety of problems such as Athlete’s foot and nail infections, leading to debilitation of the patients and can spread to other areas of the body and to other individuals (Ghannoum et al, 1999). Otherwise human mycoses are not always successfully treated since antifungal drugs show resistance or they have side effects and ineffective. Therefore, there is a need to find out more effective and less toxic, new antifungal agents by detection of antifungal compounds in medicinal plants and new antifungal agents are still needed for improvement. Opportunistic fungal infections are rising, particularly in immunocompromised individuals, largely driven by the use of immunosuppressive treatments [1]. While roughly 150 species out of 100,000 known fungi are recognized as pathogens, they cause a wide range of dangerous, often fatal infections [2]. Despite available antifungal drugs, the high rate of resistance, low efficacy, and negative side effects drive the need for new, effective, and less toxic treatments, often found in medicinal plants [3]. compounds. Medicinal plants are the ‘back bone’ of traditional remedy (Gupta et al., 1998). In addition, the traditional medicine related to treatment of both human and animal mycoses with plant-derived preparations is considered a valuable knowledge for the discovery of new antifungal drugs (Misra et al., 2000). Plants contain many biologically active molecules with different medicinal properties (Levy et al., 2003).