Antibacterial Activity of Aqueous Acetone Extracts from Acacia nilotica seeds

Abstract

Many efforts have been made to discover new antimicrobial compounds from various kinds of plants. One of such resources is folk medicines. The increasing prevalence of multidrug resistant strains of bacteria and the recent appearance of strains with reduced susceptibility to antibiotics raises the specter of untreatable bacterial infections and adds urgency to the search for new infection-fighting strategies. Acacia nilotica is a tree 5-20 m high with a dense spherical crown, stems and branches usually dark to black colored, fissured bark, grey-pinkish slash, exuding a reddish low quality gum. Pods are strongly constricted, hairy, white-grey, thick and softly tomentose. Its seeds number approximately 8000/kg. A. nilotica and other acacia species are used in folk medicine by peoples in rural areas for illnesses caused by bacteria, but this has not been confirmed by experiments.