AFRICAN BLACK LIQUID SOAP: ANTIFUNGAL AND PHYSICOCHEMICAL PROPERTIES
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Date
2020-11-04
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Agriculture environnement et sciences de l’ingénieur
Abstract
Synthetic soaps are associated with health challenges such as skin irritation and toxicity when compared with organic soaps. Thus, liquid soap was produced, fortified with and without essential oils from two botanicals, tested on four fungi and their physicochemical properties compared. Dirty dish water samples were collected from four cafeterias in the University of Ibadan, Nigeria. Fungal isolation from the water samples was done using pour plate method with Potato Dextrose Agar (PDA), incubated at room temperature for 7 days, from which their pure culture were identified. The soap was produced and divided into two portions. Essential oils from freshly collected leaves of Ocimum gratissimum and Cymbopogon citratus were extracted through hydro-distillation and introduced into a portion of the soap. The identified fungi were cultured on sterile PDA plates containing different volumes (0.5, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 mL) of the soap with and without the essential oils. The experiment was done in triplicates while the fungi cultured on PDA plates without soap served as controls. The physicochemical properties of soap with and without the essential oils were also compared. All data were analysed using ANOVA on R-programming (version 3.5) and the means were separated using DMRT. The isolated fungi were Penicillum sp., P. notatum, Aspergillus niger and Candida albicans. The soaps had significant antifungal activity on all the four fungi (p<0.05) at all volumes. The fungal mycelia growth decreased with the addition of soaps with and without essential oils. The addition of the essential oils to the soaps did not chemically denature nor alter its high cleansing effect when used in washing dirty dishes. Moreover, there was no significant difference in the physicochemical properties of the soaps with and without essential oils. The organic liquid soap showed antifungal activity and acceptable physiochemical properties.
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Keywords
Liquid soap, plant extract, essential oils, fungal isolate