Abstract :

Couroupita guianensis that belongs to the Lecythidaceae family and it is widely used as a traditional medicine. Couroupita guianensis (Lecythidaceae), is a medicinal plant which is endowed with curative properties including anti-fungal, anti-biotic, anti-septic, analgesic, anti-malarial properties. Bacteria make use of cell–cell signalling system known as Quorum sensing (QS) and respond to their own population. In most of the gram-negative bacteria, the transcriptional regulators belonging to LuxR protein plays a crucial role in QS mechanism by detecting the presence of signaling molecules known as N-acylhomoserine lactones (AHLs). Certain bacteria does not produce any of the quorum-sensing signaling molecules AHL on its own and can detect AHLs produced by other bacterial species and regulates the pathogenicity. In such cases they encodes a LuxR homolog, SdiA (Suppressor of cell division inhibition), that can recognise the AHLs produced by other bacteria. SdiA is considered as the potential drug target as its AHL binding induces the transcription of many virulent genes. In this present work, anti-quorum sensing activity of Couroupita guianensis was evaluated against Enterobacter aerogens. Anti-quorum sensing efficacy of Couroupita guianensis was estimated with reference to QS Bio-monitoring strain Chromobacterium violaceum and also the well documented Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The binding efficacy of the phytochemicals identified for the methanolic extract against CviR Protein from Chromobacterium violaceum and SdiA Protein from Enterobacter aerogens were studied.