Screening Antifungal Potential of Indian Spices and Aromatic Herbs

Different genera plants produce a wide range of secondary metabolites, aromatic principles and essential oils. These components are bioactive in nature and are used in variety of purposes like as phyto-medicine, preservative, antioxidant, fragrance and flavoring agent. Apart from routine uses, still many plants are not been fully explored and defined for bioactive role of their secondary metabolites. Similarly plant extracts of wide variety of taxa, have been reported to contain antifungal secondary metabolites and thus, natural products can certainly substitute harmful synthetic fungicides for plant disease control. Plants so are reservoir of biologically active compounds that can affect the metabolic activity of pathogens and that way help to combat the pathogen. Present research work is an effort to define the potential antifungal activity of hexane extracts of fifteen Indian commonly used Aromatic herbs and Spice plants against eleven important crop destroying fungal pathogenic strains. The finding of the present investigation also suggests that plants produce compounds or substances which are beneficial for them to survive in nature and in terms of fighting against microbes.