and Five Other Cameroonian Edible Plants with Weak or No Antibacterial Effects Modulate the Activities of Antibiotics against Gram-Negative Multidrug-Resistant Phenotypes.

In order to contribute to the fight against infectious diseases, the antibacterial activity and the antibiotic-potentiating effects of and five other Cameroonian edible plants have been evaluated against Gram-negative multidrug-resistant (MDR) phenotypes. The microdilution method was used to evaluate the bacterial susceptibility of the extracts and their combination to common antibiotics. The phytochemical screening of the extracts was carried out according to standard methods. Phytochemical analysis of the extracts revealed the presence of alkaloids, triterpenes, steroids, and polyphenols, including flavonoids in most of the tested extracts. The entire tested extracts showed moderate (512 g/mL ≤ MIC ≤ 2048 g/mL) to weak (MIC > 2048 g/mL) antibacterial activities against the tested bacteria. Furthermore, extracts of leaf of and pericarp of (at their MIC/2 and MIC/4) strongly potentiated the activities of all antibiotics used in the study, especially those of chloramphenicol (CHL), ciprofloxacin (CIP), kanamycin (KAN), and tetracycline (TET) against 70% (7/10) to 100% (10/10) of the tested MDR bacteria, with the modulating factors ranging from 2 to 128. The results of this study suggest that extracts from leaves of and pericarps of can be sources of plant-derived products with antibiotic modifying activity.