Studies on the opportunistic bacterial and fungal pathogens of the HIV+ patients and molecular characterization on the predominant isolates(mycobacterium tuberculosis and candida albicans) and the effect of herbal extracts on the isolated pathogens

Abstract

Diseases caused by bacteria and fungi are responsible for a significant proportion of the morbidity and mortality seen in HIV population. Many bacterial pathogens, including Mycobacterium, Staphylococcus, Streptococcus, Shigella, Campylobacter, Listeria and Legionella, Haemophilus, Pseudomonas, Rhodococcus and Salmonella and fungal pathogens namely Candida, Aspergillus, Histoplasma, Coccidioides, Cryptococcus, Blastomyces and Fusarium are common in persons infected with HIV. Hence this study aimed to isolate and identify the predominant bacterial and fungal pathogens from the HIV+ patients. The antibiotic sensitivity pattern of the pathogens was analysed by using ten different antibiotics. The predominant bacterial pathogen M. tuberculosis is highly resistant to firstline drugs, hence, this study worked out the characterization of isoniazid and pyrazinamide drug resistant M. tuberculosis strains using various molecular methods. The predominant fungal strain Candida albicans was also characterized by different molecular methods. Antimicrobial activity of different medicinal plants against the opportunistic pathogens was studied. Among them, ethylacetate extracts of Withania somnifera D showed better antibacterial activity and diethyl ether extracts of Acalypha indica showed effective antifungal activity upon the pathogens. Various phytochemical analyses showed the presence of various phytoconstituents. The phytochemical compounds of the extracts of W. somnifera and A. indica were identified by TLC and bioautography. Then GC-MS and FT-IR analyses were done to identify the compounds which gave high peak. The antimycobacterial activity of two effective hexane and methanolic extracts of W. somnifera were screened and applied onto multidrug resistant tuberculosis strains. Most of the resistant strains were controlled by the application of W. somnifera extracts, which fact was proved in this study.