Asian Plant Research Journal

Diabetes mellitus characterized by hyperglycemia, alteration in the metabolism of lipids, carbohydrates and proteins. One of the possible approaches to prevent dietary carbohydrate absorption, is the regulation of postprandial blood glucose level by intake of some naturally available anti-diabetic potential plant extracts. Chromolaena odorata is one of the potential anti-diabetic plants and belonging to family Asteraceae. However, there is no scientific report on anti-diabetic activity of leaf extracts of C. odorata. The present study was aimed to assess the in vitro anti-diabetic potential of various solvent based leaf extracts of C. odorata along with their chromatographic profiling. The inhibitory effect of various solvent based leaf extracts of C. odorata were examined for alpha amylase and alpha glucosidase enzymes. All the plant extracts were subjected to both TLC and HPTLC for chromatographic profiling. Cytotoxicity activities of methanolic extract were assessed on L6 skeletal muscle cell lines. Among various leaf extracts, methanolic extract showed significant (P<0.05) inhibitory activity against alpha amylase and alpha glucosidase enzymes (IC₅₀ 3.03±0.18 µg mL^-1 and 4.97±0.21 µg mL^-1, respectively). During chromatographic profiling, methanolic extract only had more phytocompounds. Better cytotoxicity was shown by methanolic extract compared to other extracts. Leaf methanolic extract exhibited potential in vitro anti-diabetic activity that mainly could be regulated by high phenolic acids and flavonoid contents which confirmed through HTPLC profiling. These findings support the traditional use of C. odorata in the management of diabetes and suggest that its bioactive constituents could serve as promising leads for the development of novel anti-diabetic agents.