Aqueous spice extracts as alternative antimycotics to control highly drug resistant extensive biofilm forming clinical isolates of Candida albicans

Bindu Sadanandan; Vaniyamparambath Vijayalakshmi; Priya Ashrit; Uddagiri Venkanna Babu; Lakavalli Mohan Sharath Kumar; Vasulingam Sampath; Kalidas Shetty; Amruta Purushottam Joglekar; Rashmi Awaknavar

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0281035

Aqueous spice extracts as alternative antimycotics to control highly drug resistant extensive biofilm forming clinical isolates of Candida albicans

PLoS One. 2023 Jun 14;18(6):e0281035. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0281035. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Bindu Sadanandan¹, Vaniyamparambath Vijayalakshmi¹, Priya Ashrit¹, Uddagiri Venkanna Babu², Lakavalli Mohan Sharath Kumar², Vasulingam Sampath², Kalidas Shetty³, Amruta Purushottam Joglekar¹, Rashmi Awaknavar¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Biotechnology, M S Ramaiah Institute of Technology, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India.
² Department of Phytochemistry, Research and Development, The Himalaya Drug Company, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India.
³ Department of Plant Sciences, North Dakota State University, Fargo, North Dakota, United States of America.

Abstract

Candida albicans form biofilm by associating with biotic and abiotic surfaces. Biofilm formation by C. albicans is relevant and significant as the organisms residing within, gain resistance to conventional antimycotics and are therefore difficult to treat. This study targeted the potential of spice-based antimycotics to control C. albicans biofilms. Ten clinical isolates of C. albicans along with a standard culture MTCC-3017 (ATCC-90028) were screened for their biofilm-forming ability. C. albicans M-207 and C. albicans S-470 were identified as high biofilm formers by point inoculation on Trypticase Soy Agar (TSA) medium as they formed a lawn within 16 h and exhibited resistance to fluconazole and caspofungin at 25 mcg and 8 mcg respectively. Aqueous and organic spice extracts were screened for their antimycotic activity against C. albicans M-207 and S-470 by agar and disc diffusion and a Zone of Inhibition was observed. Minimal Inhibitory Concentration was determined based on growth absorbance and cell viability measurements. The whole aqueous extract of garlic inhibited biofilms of C. albicans M-207, whereas whole aqueous extracts of garlic, clove, and Indian gooseberry were effective in controlling C. albicans S-470 biofilm within 12 h of incubation. The presence of allicin, ellagic acid, and gallic acid as dominant compounds in the aqueous extracts of garlic, clove, and Indian gooseberry respectively was determined by High-Performance Thin Layer Chromatography and Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry. The morphology of C. albicans biofilm at different growth periods was also determined through bright field microscopy, phase contrast microscopy, and fluorescence microscopy. The results of this study indicated that the alternate approach in controlling high biofilm-forming, multi-drug resistant clinical isolates of C. albicans M-207 and S-470 using whole aqueous extracts of garlic, clove, and Indian gooseberry is a safe, potential, and cost-effective one that can benefit the health care needs with additional effective therapeutics to treat biofilm infections.

Copyright: © 2023 Sadanandan et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

MeSH terms

Agar
Antioxidants
Biofilms
Biological Products*
Candida albicans
Garlic*
Spices

Substances

Agar
Antioxidants
Biological Products

Grants and funding

This research was funded by DEPARTMENT OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY (DST), Government of India, grant number SR/FT/LS-124/2012 to Bindu Sadanandan. The funders had no role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. URL: https://dst.gov.in/.