Common Garlic (Allium sativum) has Potent Anti-Bacillus anthracis Activity among Various Commonly Used Spices and Herbs

Anthrax remains an important but relatively neglected disease of animals and humans. Its control in animals can be easily achieved by employing available vaccines. It is highly preventable in animals as well as humans. However, poverty, lack of information and appropriate medical support in the poor endemic areas of the world are some of the major obstacles in its control. We hypothesize that some of the commonly available plants in poor endemic areas which are used as food and also employed in traditional medicine may have potent anti-Bacillus anthracis activity in a form amenable to use in the endemic areas. Evaluation of the aqueous extracts made from various commonly available plants for antiBacillus anthracis activity indicated Garlic (Allium sativum) as the most promising candidate. It consistently inhibited the growth of Bacillus anthracis in agar-well diffusion assay and decreased the viable cell counts in liquid-broth cultures by 6-logs within 6-12 h. Characterization of the bioactive fractions of Aqueous Garlic Extract by GC-MS analysis indicated the presence of previously unreported constituents such as phthalic acid derivatives, acid esters, phenyl group containing compounds, steroids etc. The anti-Bacillus anthracis activity in the Aqueous Garlic Extract displayed acceptable thermostability (>80% anti-Bacillus anthracis activity retained on incubation at 50C for 12 h) and did not antagonize the activity of FDA-approved antibiotics used for anthrax control. Further work should be undertaken to explore the possible application/use of Aqueous Garlic Extract in preventing anthrax incidences in endemic areas. peer-reviewed) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not . http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/162214 doi: bioRxiv preprint first posted online Jul. 11, 2017;