Bioprospecção de produtos vegetais do cerrado maranhense com atividade anti-helmíntica

Abstract

The helminth infections represent a serious problem for the production of small ruminants, currently aggravated by resistance to anthelmintics products, which has stimulated the search for new forms of control, among them natural products. The selection of plant species with pharmaceutical potential can be achieved by different approaches, highlighting ethnoveterinary and ethological. The objective of this study was to document ethnoveterinary knowledge on plants used by inhabitants of a rural community in the state of Maranhão, selecting and scientifically validating plants with high frequency of reports of use as anthelmintics, in addition to being consumed voluntarily by goats. The acetone (Act) and hydroalcoholic (ETH) extracts of plant species Turnera ulmifolia L. (leaves and roots), Parkia platycephala Benth. (leaves and seeds) and Dimorphandra gardneriana Tul. (leaves and bark) were tested in vitro against Haemonchus contortus, through using Eggs Hatching Assay (EHA), using concentrations ranging from 0.3 to 10 mg/mL, Larval Exsheathment Inhibition Assay (LEIA) at concentrations of 37.5 μg/mL to 1200 μg/mL and Larval Development Assay (LDA). A second set of incubations were made using polyvinylpolypyrrolidone (PVPP) to determine the influence of polyphenols on the anthelmintics effect in EHA and LEIA. Data from each extract were used to calculate median lethal concentration (LC50) for each test. All tested extracts showed activity against at least one life stage of H. contortus.. The use of PVPP showed that the tannins are not the only extracts of secondary metabolites responsible for the anthelmintic effects. The results show that the use of ethnoveterinary and ethological criteria are promising in the search for potential therapeutic substances and that the extracts evaluated showed an anthelmintic effect and may be an alternative for the control of gastrointestinal nematodes of goats.