Bioactive potential of endophytic fungi isolated from Phyllanthus niruri L.

Abstract

Present work describes the isolation and morphological identification of endophytic fungi from Phyllanthus niruri L. including their chemical and bioactivity screening. Two isolated and purified endophytic fungi with the internal strain numbers PNRE and PNLE were taxonomically identified as Colletotrichum sp. and Fusarium sp., respectively. Preliminary chemical screening of the fungal extracts through thin layer chromatography (TLC) revealed the presence of various components. PNLE showed significant antifungal activity against the fungi Aspergillus niger (24 mm) and Aspergillus flavus (20 mm). Extracts of PNRE and PNLE gave significant cytotoxic activity with LC₅₀ values of 1.08 μg mL^-1 and 1.05 μg mL^-1, respectively in the brine shrimp lethality bioassay. PNRE extract showed mild scavenging of DPPH with IC₅₀ value of 96.06 μg mL^-1 during antioxidant activity screening. Crystal formation was observed in the crude PNRE fungal extract which was purified using methanol/dichloromethane (0-20%) to obtain pure white crystal and the structure was elucidated by NMR (1H NMR and 13C NMR) spectroscopic analysis to be confirmed as ergosterol. Since isolated fungi showed promising antifungal and cytotoxic activities, the crude extract of endophytic fungi of P. niruri could be considered as a promising source for isolation of potential bioactive compounds.

Bangladesh J. Sci. Ind. Res.55(4), 311-318, 2020