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Concerns about health issues and environmental pollution stimulate research to find new health and hygiene related products with healing properties and minimum negative effect on the environment. Development of new, natural antibacterial agents has become one of the most important research areas to combat some pathogens such as Gram- positive and Gram-negative bacteria, fungi, algae, yeast, and some microorganisms which cause serious human infections. Lawsonia Inermis (henna) leaf extracts for preparation of antibacterial poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) and poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) nanofibers via electrospinning technique were investigated. PEO and PVA based electrospun fibers containing henna extract were verified by the appearance of FTIR peaks corresponding to the pure extract. Our study demonstrates that 2.793 wt.% Li in PVA and PEO based solutions showed bactericidal effects against Staphylococcus aureus and bacteriostatic action to Escherichia coli. Concentrations of henna leaf extract strongly impacted antibacterial activities against both bacteria. Henna leaves have a great potential to be used as a source of a potent eco-friendly antimicrobial agent.

Lawsonia inermis Linn. (Lythraceae) or henna has been used since the earliest times as a medicine, preservative, and cosmetic. It has long been recommended in traditional medicine as an astringent, purgative, and abortifacient.Lawsone and six extracts of L. inermis plant, used by Algerian traditional healers to treat infectious diseases, were screened for their antifungal activity against filamentous fungi.Water and five organic extracts - DMSO, ethanol, chloroform, ethyl acetate, and di-ethyl ether - of L. inermis leaves, collected in the area of Adrar (Algeria), were prepared by soaking 25 g of powdered plant in 100 mL of solvent. The extracts were screened for antifungal activity using the poisoned food technique against five filamentous fungi.Results demonstrated that the best yield (8.03%) was obtained with the ethanol extract. The commercial lawsone showed potentially interesting MICs against the strains Fusarium oxysporum (12 µg/mL) and Aspergillus flavus (50 µg/mL). The ethanol extract showed the only interesting MIC (230 µg/mL of crude extract) against the strain F. oxysporum compared with other extracts.These results suggest that the Algerian L. inermis plant has antifungal activity that can be related to the presence of lawsone in the leaves plant. The results can be exploited largely in research of new antifungal drugs.

A pot experiment was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of aqueous extracts of six plant species, namely Azadirachta indica A. Juss. (neem), Alstonia scholaris (L.) R. Br., Lawsonia alba Lam., Allium cepa L., A. sativum L. and Zingiber officinale Roscoe, and a systemic fungicide carbendazim 50% (w/w) WP, to manage the corm-rot disease of Gladiolus (Gladiolus grandiflorus L.) caused by a fungal pathogen Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. gladioli (Massey) Snyd.Hans. Fusarium inoculation showed 80% disease incidence with 54 disease lesions per corm. Recommended dose of the chemical fungicide carbendazim significantly reduced the disease incidence to 13% and number of lesions to six per corm. Plant extract treatments exhibited variable effects on the incidence and severity of the disease. In general, all the test plant extracts managed the corm-rot disease to some extent. Aqueous bulb extracts of A. sativum and A. cepa and the rhizome extract of Z. officinale showed better disease management potential than that of the recommended dose of carbendazim. Fusarium inoculation significantly declined shoot growth. In general, carbendazim, as well as aqueous extracts, enhanced shoot growth to variable extents as compared to the Fusarium control.

From the aerial parts of Lawsonia alba two new dioxin derivatives, namely 12-[2′-(1′, 4′-dioxin-5′, 6′-dione)-8″E-undecenyl-dodecanoate (1) and 5-[1′-(docosa-2′E, 5′E-dienyl)]-1,4-dioxin-2,3-dione (2), were isolated and characterised on the basis of spectroscopic methods.

The protein glycation inhibitory activity of ethanolic extract of Lawsonia inermis (henna) plant tissues was evaluated in vitro using the model system of bovine serum albumin and glucose. Protein oxidation and glycation are posttranslational modifications that are implicated in the pathological development of many age-related disease processes. This study investigated the effects of Lawsonia inermis ethanolic extract and its components, on protein damage induced by a free radical generator in in vitro assay system. We found that alcoholic extract of Lawsonia inermis can effectively protect against protein damage and showed that its action is mainly due to Lawsone. In addition, the presence of gallic acid also plays an important role in the protective activity against protein oxidation and glycation. Two known compounds, namely, Lawsone and gallic acid previously isolated from this plant were subjected to glycation bioassay for the first time. It was found that the alcoholic extract, lawsone (1) and gallic acid (2) showed significant inhibition of Advanced Glycated End Products (AGEs) formation and exhibit 77.95%, 79.10% and 66.98% inhibition at a concentration of 1500 microg/mL, 1000 microg/mL and 1000 microM respectively. Lawsonia inermis, compounds 1 and 2 were found to be glycation inhibitors with IC(50) 82.06 +/- 0.13 microg/mL, 67.42 +/- 1.46 microM and 401.7 +/- 6. 23 microM respectively. This is the first report on the glycation activity of these compounds and alcoholic extract of Lawsonia inermis.