Journal of Mosquito Research 2015, Vol.5, No.18, 1-8
2
effect of plant-borne compounds (essential oils and
plant extracts) against a wide range of mosquito species
(Sukumar et al., 1991; Arivoli et al., 1999, 2012a,b,
2015a; Shaalan et al., 2005; Sakthivadivel and Daniel,
2008; Ghosh et al., 2012; Samuel et al., 2012a,b;
Vargas, 2012; Raveen et al., 2012, 2014, 2015; Han et
al., 2013; Benelli et al., 2014; Dias and Moraes, 2014;
Samuel and William, 2014; Wachira et al., 2014;
Rathy et al., 2015a,b; Tehri and Singh, 2015).
Murraya
koenigii
(L.) Spreng (Rutaceae) commonly
called ‘curry leaf’ in English, ‘karivepu’ or ‘karuveppilai’
in Tamil, ‘karipatta’ in Hindi, ‘girinimba’ in Sanskrit,
‘karibevu’ in Kannada, ‘kariveppu’ in Malayalam,
‘kadhilimb’ in Marathi and ‘karepeku’ in Telugu
(Kumar et al., 2015) is an aromatic, deciduous shrub
or a small tree found cultivated throughout India
(Satyavati et al., 1987).
Murraya
koenigii
is used as a
spice for its characteristic flavour and aroma and as a
flavouring agent in curries and chutneys (Anonymous,
1998). The plant is used in Indian system of medicine
to treat various ailments and also in traditional
medicine
viz
., ayurvedic and unani.
Murraya
koenigii
leaves are used in the ayurvedic system of medicine
(Purthi, 1976). Chevalier (1996) reported curry leaf
for its medicinal value
viz
., antiemetic, antidiarrhoeal
and as a blood purifier. The oil is applied externally to
bruises and eruptions (Anonymous, 1998). The juice
of tender leaves is taken orally to stop vomiting
(Muthu et al., 2006) and juice of roots is given to
relieve pain associated with kidneys (Sharma et al.,
2010). The leaves are used for the treatment of piles,
headache, stomach ache, influenza, rheumatism, traumatic
injury, insect and snake bite, diarrhoea, dysentery
(Kong et al., 1986) and to allay heat of the body
(Kirtikar and Basu, 1993). The leaves, barks and roots
are used intensively in indigenous medicine from
ancient time as a tonic for stomach ache, stimulant
and carminative (Purthi, 1998).
Murraya
koenigii
is
also used in folk remedies and has a broad range of
therapeutic effects including analgesic, alexiteric,
febrifuge and also in treating leucoderma and blood
disorders (Kirtikar and Basu, 1994).
The phytochemical constituents present in
Murraya
koenigii
are tocopherol, β-carotene, lutein, alkaloids
(Khanum et al., 2000), volatile oils, glycozoline,
xanthotoxin, sesquiterpenes, carbazole alkaloids
viz
.,
murrayanine, mahanimbine, girinimbine, murrayacine,
isomurrayazoline, mahanine, koenine, koenigine,
koenidine, koeinimbine, and murrayazoline (Narasimhan,
1968; Kureel et al., 1970; Bordner et al., 1972).
Further, the plant also possess antibacterial (Thomas et
al., 1999), antifungal (Kishore et al., 1982), antiprotozoal
(Goutam and Purohit, 1974), hypoglycaemic (Arulselvan
et al., 2006), antioxidant (Ningappa et al., 2008),
hypolipidemic (Khan et al., 1996), antimicrobial
(Mathur et al., 2010), hepatoprotective (Pande et al.,
2009), anti-inflammatory (Srivastava and Srivastava,
1993), anticancer/antitumor and antimutagenic (Nakahara
et al., 2002) properties. Moreover,
Murraya
koenigii
also possess insecticidal properties
viz
., antifeedant
(Kostic et al., 2008). Arivoli and Samuel (2011) have
reported the larvicidal activity of the crude hexane
leaf extracts of
Murraya
koenigii
against
Aedes
aegypti
,
Anopheles
stephensi
and
Culex quinquefasciatus
.
Kovendan et al. (2012) reported on the larvicidal
activity of crude hexane, chloroform and ethyl acetate
leaf extracts of
Murraya
koenigii
against
Culex
quinquefasciatus
. Besides, the activity of silver
nanoparticles of
Murraya
koenigii
ethanolic leaf
extracts were studied against the larvae and pupae of
Anopheles
stephensi
and
Aedes
aegypti
(Suganya et al.,
2013). Therefore, the present study was carried out to
evaluate the larvicidal property of isolated fractions of
Murraya
koenigii
hexane leaf extracts against the
vector mosquitoes
viz
.,
Aedes
aegypti
,
Anopheles
stephensi
and
Culex
quinquefasciatus
.
2 Materials and Methods
2.1 Plant collection and preparation of crude extract
Murraya koenigii
leaves were collected in and around
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India (12.9213°N, 80.1220°E).
Taxonomical identity of the plant was confirmed at the
Department of Plant Biology and Biotechnology,
Loyola College, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. The
leaves were brought to the laboratory, shade dried
under room temperature and powdered using an
electric blender. Dried and powdered leaves (1 kg)
were subjected to extraction using 3 L of hexane for a
period of 72 hours to obtain the crude extracts using
rotary vacuum evaporator. The hexane crude extract
thus obtained was refrigerated at 4
º
C.
2.2 Isolation and fractionation of crude extracts by
column chromatography
The residue from the crude extract of
Murraya
koenigii
(44.786g) was mixed with silica gel (60-120
