THE EFFECT OF AQUEOUS AND METHANOL EXTRACTS OF MORINGA OLEIFERA (LAM) AERIAL PARTS ON FUNGI ISOLATED FROM SELECTED VARIETIES OF SORGHUM BICOLOR L. RESEARCH TOPICS ON BIOLOGY
ABSTRACT
This study was conducted in finding out the invitro effects of aqueous and methanol extracts of Moringa oleifera (Lam) aerial parts on fungi isolated from some selected varieties of Sorghum bicolor L. Different varieties of Sorghum bicolor L. namely Samsorg 17, Samsorg 40, Samsorg 42, Samsorg 43 were obtained from Plant Science Department IAR, and a local land race Kaura was collected from Sabon Gari Market in Zaria. Five different fungi namelyAspergillusflavusLink,Aspergillus niger
VanTieghem,Fusarium oxysporum Schlecht, Rhizopus stolonifer (Ehrenb.)Lind and Phoma herbarum Sacc were isolated from the grains. These were isolated on both potato dextrose agar(PDA) and Saboraud‟s dextrose agar(SDA) using the agar plate method. The predominance of Aspergillusspp. indicate that they possibly act as pioneer organisms in the seed borne infection while the presence of other isolates show that there is possible succession of fungi in the seed borne infection. On invitro culture of these organisms in PDA amended with varying concentrations of MoringaoleiferaLam extracts (Aqueous and Methanol) from the leaves, seeds and stem bark using the radial growth method, extract from the leaves were found to be more effective than the other two in the mycelia growth inhibition of the isolated fungi. Growth of these fungi inhibits more in the presence of higher concentrations as compared to lower concentrations of extract. However the cumulative effects of these extracts were found to vary with concentration, plant parts, pathogen as well as type of solvent used for the extraction.
CHAPTER ONE
1.0Â Â Â INTRODUCTION
Sorghum (Sorghum bicolor L.) is the fifth most important world cereal and an important native cereal in Africa (FAO, 1995 and ICRISAT, 1996; Murty and Renard, 2001). Total world production of sorghum in the year 2002 was estimated at about 54 million tons (FAO, 2004) and annual production of about 70 million metric tons of grains from 50 million hectares of land (National Academic of Science, 1996). Sorghum is also the dietary staple of more than 500 million people in more than 30 countries (National Academic of Science, 1996)
