PLANT-BASED ADJUNCTS FOR ANTIBIOTIC RESISTANCE: FOCUS ON MENTHA ESSENTIAL OILS

Abstract

Antimicrobial resistance is the domain of more concerns in health care system because it is leading to the failure of chemotherapy. Resistant bacteria have been reported as high priority pathogen by world Health Organization in 2017 A.D. The worldwide prevalence of resistant is touching significant number in countries along Indian and Atlantic Ocean. The basic mechanism to develop resistance against antibiotics is genetic mutation that enables bacteria to produce proteins such as penicillinase to destroy antibiotics or activation of efflux pump and biofilm formation. Flora has been pioneer source of medicine since evolution of life. Whenever, there is new pathological condition in the world, secondary metabolites and essential oils of plants have played crucial role either in the domain of anti-microbes or receptor’s agonist and antagonists. In the area of antimicrobial resistance, secondary metabolites or essential oils are potent adjuvants for antibiotics. Essential oils are more effective against gram positive as compare to negative bacterium because these allow the passage of lipophilic substance in to cytoplasm while negative bacteria do not allow the passage of lipophilic substance due to presence of extra lyophilic layer. Essential oils and secondary metabolites reduce the minimum inhibitory concentration of antibiotics and overcome the adaptive mechanism of resistance. In this paper we will discuss genus Mentha as source of adjuvants of antibiotics to overcome antimicrobial resistance.