Evaluation of phytochemicals and amino acid profiles of four vegetables grown on a glyphosate contaminated soil in Southwestern Nigeria

Abstract Green vegetables are examples of staple plants eating in Nigeria, and are assumed to be a well-off basis of phytochemicals and amino acids that are useful for the management and prevention of infections. However, in the farming of these vegetables, glyphosate-based herbicides (GBH (round up™)) are used as control against pests invasions which has cause reasons to be concern about their effects on the phyto-constituents present in these vegetables. In this study, we evaluated the phytochemicals constituents and amino acid profile of the leaves of Telfairia occidentalis Hook F, Amaranthus viridis Linn, Celosia argentea Linn and Cnidoscolus aconitifolius (Mill.) I. M. Johnst popular edible vegetables in Southwestern Nigeria. The vegetables seeds of these plants mentioned above were acquired from Institute of Agricultural Research and Training (IAR&T) Ibadan. And on a land designed and previously treated with a GBH (round up™) the seeds were planted and allowed to grow. A destructive method of leaves after maturation was achieved by out rightly plucking them out and air-drying under shade. Phytochemical assessments were done on milled plant samples to determine the presence of ten phyto-constituents. Centrifugation of powdered samples (2 g each) with acetonitrile at 1000 rotations per minute’s (rpm) was used to extract amino acids. Thereafter the extracts were individually spotted on a thin layer chromatography (TLC) plate and developed using the mobile phase consisting of methanol: acetic acid: water in ratio 7:2:1 v/v. The visualization for the presence of amino acids was completed by spraying the developed chromatographic plates with 0.5% ninhydrin in 2-propanol solution and observed in both day light and under the ultraviolet lamp and the retention factor (R f ).calculated for the different spots developed to determine the type of amino acids present. The assessment of phytochemicals from the four vegetables reveals the presence of alkaloids, tannins and steroids in all samples while anthraquinone glycosides, terpenoids and cardiac glycosides were absent and other phytochemicals varying in them. Ssaponins was found absent in Telfairia occidentalis and flavonoids in Cnidoscolus aconitifolius respectively. The observation of the TLC plates in daylight shows that the vegetables likely contained primary, secondary and proline amino acids while the calculation of the R f values of the TLC spots observed under an ultraviolet (UV) light indicated that amino acids found in the vegetables were methionine, tyrosine, leucine, isoleucine. However, phenylalanine was found only in Celosia argentea. The study evaluated phytochemicals and amino acids parameters in four leafy vegetables grown on contaminated glyphosate based herbicide soil and assessments shows that their medicinal properties were not altered with the minimal exposure to contaminant.