Phytochemical Screening by GCMS Analysis of Leaf Extract of Ocimum sanctum and Mentha arvensis in Different Organic Solvents

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INTRODUCTION
Since most medicinal plants have less adverse effects than synthetic medications, they are frequently utilised as complementary treatment for human and animal illnesses.Knowing the chemical makeup of the phytochemicals found in medicinal plants can help us understand the many functional groups behind those compounds' therapeutic effects 1 .
Due to their capacity to heal a range of illnesses, medicinal plants play a vital part in Siddha, Ayurveda, and the Unani school of medicine.The traditional medical system employs plant sources for medications that have no adverse effects on the human body, according to recent research employing animal models 2 .Glucosides are a key metabolite involved in cellular activities.Secondary metabolites, which develop in response to stress and have a more complex structural composition, include alkaloids, flavonoids, terpenoids, steroids, and saponins 3 .A critical phase of the drug development process is the screening for phytochemicals.Phytochemicals present in plants, such as saponins, flavanoids, steroids, alkaloids, phenols, Tannins, glycosides, and terpenoids, are a great source of new and exciting medications [4][5][6][7] .The current work, was intended to perform phytochemical and FTIR analyses on the leaves of Mentha arvensis and Ocimum sanctum in various organic solvents.

Methods of extraction
The plants were gathered from the neighbourhood and washed thoroughly with water.The leaves were dried in shade and powdered for extraction.The dried powder of Mentha arvensis and Ocimum sanctum leaves was kept in contact with the different solvents in a stoppered container for 24 h with frequent agitation until the soluble matter is dissolved.This method is best suitable for use in case of the thermolabile drugs.

Parameters for characterization
The different solvent extracts of Mentha arvensis and Ocimum sanctum leaves were analysed for the following parameters as shown in Table 1.

Phytochemical analysis
Tables 2 and 3 in the current study present the results of phytochemical analyses of the following plants: Ocimum sanctum and Mentha arvensis.The positive sign (+) denotes the presence of a specific phytochemical component in plants, whereas the negative sign (-) denotes the absence of that component in plants.Depending   The presence of saponins, flavanoids, steroids, alkaloids, phenols, Tannins, glycosides, and terpenoids indicates high medicinal value.The phytochemical analysis of all the plants indicate that all the selected plants have medicinal value and strong potential to be valuable treatments for improving human health.Using chromatographic and spectroscopic methods, the current work leads to future research in the separation and identification of the active compound from the selected plants.Considering the presence of maximum phytochemicals in ethanol and hexane extracts, the following FTIR analysis was done for ethanol and hexane extracts only.

GCMS Analysis
The GCMS result show no presence of any heterocyclic compounds as in case of alkaloids and carbohydrates.The presence of -O-linkage in the different structures obtained indicates the presence of glycosides.None of the extracts contain steroids and Tannins.The presence of alkaloids is confirmed in mentha plant by the presence of amines.
The GCMS study for all the plant extracts except the Ethanol extract of Ocimum shows the presence of long chain hydrocarbons indicating the presence of higher fatty acids and higher esters.
The GCMS chromatograms obtained for ethanol and hexane extracts of Ocimum and Mentha plant are shown in the following tables respectively.The peaks obtained at 15.916 and 17.061 min clearly indicates the presence of flavonoids.The peak with molecular weight 168 indicates the presence of phenolic compound.The peaks at run time 19.588 and 23.934 shows the presence of terpenoids and saponins.The presence of glycosidic linkages can be confirmed from peaks at 15.916, 19.588 and 28.162.From the above table it is found that the peaks at 10.688, 11.458 and 23.917 min confirms the presence for terpenoids and saponins.The peaks at 20.125, 20.833, 21.188 and 22.833 min indicate the presence of glycosidic linkages.The alkaloid is shown by the peak at 12.354 minutes.The peak obtained at 28.667 min shows the presence for long chain hydrocarbons.

CONCLUSION
The phytochemicals that medicinal plants generate may end up being effective therapeutic agents for promoting human health.More and more, research on the phytochemical composition of plants is being used as the initial step in the search for powerful medications.The current research sets the door for future research utilizing the GCMS analysis to isolate and identify the active chemical from the selected plants.The two plants Ocimum sanctum and Mentha arvensis have very strong medicinal potential.
The peak at 15.457 min indicates the presence phenolic compound, flavonoids and the glycosidic linkage.The presence of flavonoids is further confirmed by the peak obtained at 15.914 minutes.The peaks obtained at 19.591 and 23.931 min indicate the presences of terpenoids and saponins.