Sesbania cannabina

Plant phenolics, saponins and flavonoids have a powerful biological activity, which outlines the necessity of their determination. The present work was aimed to determine the total phenolic, flavonoid and saponin contents in ethyl acetate and methanol extracts of Sesbania cannabina leaves. The total phenolic content was determined by folin-ciocatechu reagent using gallic acid as standard and total flavonoid content by aluminium chloride assay using rutin as a standard .The total saponin content was determined by vanillin reagent using diosgenin as a standard. Methanol extract of leaves showed highest amount of total phenolic content (231±0.86 mg/g equivalent of Gallic acid), total flavonoid content (87.10±0.38 mg/g equivalent of rutin) and total saponin content (50.66±0.57 mg/g equivalent of diosgenin). The results obtained from the present study provides evidence that extracts of Sesbania cannabina leaves contains secondary metabolites and this justifies the use of plant species as traditional medicine for treatment of various diseases.