Antidiabetic and antioxidant potential of Zanthoxylum armatum DC. leaves (Rutaceae): An endangered medicinal plant

The present study was designed to evaluate the antidiabetic and antioxidant potential of methanolic extract of Zanthoxylum armatum leaves using in vitro approaches. The concentration of plant extract that inhibited 50% (IC50) of alpha amylase was found to be 89.37±4.68 ?g/ml which is higher than standard. Results of this study shows that 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl scavenging test show high radical scavenging activity as compared to hydrogen peroxide scanvenging method with IC50 Value of 57.83 ?g/ml and 79.13 ?g/ml, respectively. Plant extract found to exhibit enormous amount of phenols and flavonoid content i.e., 140.71 mg GAE/g and 88.53 mg of Quercetin/g of extract respectively. Further phytochemical analysis revealed that plant exhibit glycosides, alkaloids, terpenoids, flavonoids, saponin and tannin that are frequently implicated as having antidiabetic effects. Elemental analysis revealed the presence of essential elements ‘Mg’, ‘Mn’, ‘Zn’, ‘Fe’, ‘K’, ‘P’, ‘Ca’, ‘Cu’, ‘Mo’ and ‘Ni’ known to play role in regulating blood glucose. It could be speculated that the observed antidiabetic activity of Z. armatum might be related to the presence of these phytochemicals, phenolic compounds as well as mineral elements which found to be the important constituent of Z. armatum. These results indicate that Z. armatum could be an excellent source of natural antioxidants and exhibited antidiabetic activity.