Tesfay Kahsay

Leaves of Balanites aegyptiaca have been used in Africa as traditional medicine in the form of juice to treat diarrhea, dysentery, cuts and wounds. So this study is intended to discover the antioxidant and antibacterial activity of Balanites aegyptiaca leaves. Leaves were macerated using methanol to get a crude extract. Antioxidant activity of methanol extract was found to be 89.6 % at 1 mg/mL with IC50 value of 182.02 μg/mL (r2 = 0.9883) using DPPH (2, 2-Diphenyl-1-picryl hydrazyl) free radical scavenging method. In addition, the antibacterial activity of the methanolic leaf extracts was assessed on one gram-positive and one gram-negative bacterium using the disc diffusion assay. Antibacterial activity of methanol extract was higher for Escherichia coli with 8.15 ± 1.22 mm zone of inhibition and for Staphylococcus aureus methanol extract was not effective with the zone of inhibition of 0.00 ± 0.00 mm. The methanolic leaves extract of B. aegyptiaca revealed potential antioxidant activity but antibacterial activity was found to be relatively lower to that of the standard antibiotics used.