Phytochemical analysis, antiproliferative and antifungal activities of different Syzygium aromaticum solvent extracts

The outbreaks of fungal resistance to the different antifungal agents represent a public health problem resulting in a significant morbidity and mortality. Furthermore, chemotherapy represents a serious issue in the cancer treatment worldwide. Accordingly, the efficiency of clove extracts as anticandidal and antitumoral agents was evaluated. Disk diffusion and 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol)-2,5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT) techniques were achieved to evaluate the antimycotic and antiproliferative activities of different clove extracts. The active phytochemicals of clove extracts were analyzed using gas chromatography mass spectrometry. Resistance of Candida glabrata strain to clotrimazole was obvious while C. albicans and C. tropicalis expressed dose dependent susceptibility. In contrast, the clove acetonic extract expressed the highest antimycotic proficiency against C. glabrata, C. albicans and C. tropicalis strains with suppressive zones of 18.54 ± 0.24, 19.86 ± 0.34 and 22.6 ± 0.32 mm respectively. While, the ethanolic clove extract displayed the uppermost antiproliferative efficiency with relative IC50 of 6.80 µg/mL. Phytochemical analysis showed that eugenol compound was the most prominent active ingredient of clove acetonic and ethanolic extracts with corresponding proportions of 46.53 and 54.71 % respectively. Anticandidal activity of the main active ingredient, eugenol, was significantly higher than that of clotrimazole, used as control, against C. glabrata strain (P ≤ 0.05). The proficiency of antimicrobial activity of clove and its major constituent, eugenol, against candidal strains supports utilizing these extracts in fabrication of anticandidal drugs especially against the resistant C. glabrata strain. Also, these extracts could be a source of adjuvant anticancer therapies due to their potent antiproliferative activity.