ABSTRACT:
In recent years, compounds with biological properties produced by plants have received attention as an alternative to control microorganisms. Essential oils extracted from green leaves of Eucalyptus sp. have been demonstrated to have antimicrobial activities, but so far there are no reports of antimicrobial activity of essential oils extracted from dried leaves of Eucalyptus staigeriana. So, the objectives of this study were to determine the chemical composition of the essential oils obtained from dried leaves of E. staigeriana (EOdlES) and to evaluate in vitro antimicrobial and antibiofilm activities of EOdlES against gram-positive and gram-negative, resistance and multiresistant Enterococcus faecalis isolated from food and clinical samples. The characterization of EOdlES was performed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS). For this study, 26 bacterial strains were used, which included 11 reference strains and 15 antibiotic resistant and multiresistant E. faecalis strains. Antimicrobial activities of EOdlES against gram-positive and gram-negative were determined using the disc diffusion method. The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) value was evaluated by a microbroth dilution technique. The antibiofilm effects were assessed by microtiter plate method. As a result, 21 compounds were identified, being oxygenated monoterpenes (69.58%) the major chemical family. EOdlES showed only antimicrobial activity against gram-positive strains. E. faecalis resistant and multiresistant strains show the lowest MIC (3.12 to 6.25%), when compared with reference E. faecalis strain. EOdlES has the ability to inhibit the biofilm formation, but little or none ability to inhibit the preformed biofilm. This study demonstrates that EOdlES is a promising alternative to control important foodborne and clinic gram-positive resistant bacteria.
KEYWORDS:
antimicrobial activity; antibiofilm activity; essential oils; dried leaves; antibiotic-resistant strains; Eucalyptus staigeriana