Phytochemical and pharmacological investigation on hypoglycemia, sedation, antianxiety, free-radical scavenging, and cytotoxicity actions of Mimosa diplotricha C. Wright (Nila grass)

Abstract Background Mimosa diplotricha is an ethnic medicinal plant that has numerous ethnopharmacological applications. Here, tested the crude methanol extract (MDME), petroleum ether (MDPE), chloroform (MDCF), and n-hexane (MDNH) fractions of M. diplotricha in vivo to determine their bioactivities, specifically CNS and oral hypoglycemic, and evaluated their antioxidant and cytotoxicity in vitro. Method Oral hypoglycemic activity was measured by an oral glucose tolerance test. Central nervous system activities were done by elevated plus maze (EPM), hole board, hole cross, and open field method. Antioxidant activity was measured by a superoxide scavenging and ferric-reducing effect assay. Cytotoxicity was determined by using a brine-shrimp lethality bioassay. Result The test samples MDME and MDME markedly reduced the blood glucose levels after 90 min of the test interval, with values of 33.58% and 39.92%, respectively. In the open-field and hole-crossed tests, all the test samples exhibited reduced locomotor activities that preceded significant sedative activity. Among them, MDNH (p < 0.001) showed a marked sedative effect. During the EPM test, mice treated with MDME and its fractions preferred to remain in the open arm, indicating antianxiety-like behavior, whereas in the hole board model, MDME extract showed a reduction in head dipping compared to standard diazepam. In the antioxidant assay, the MDME extract demonstrated a significantly lower IC50 value in the superoxide scavenging and ferric reducing assays, respectively. In the cytotoxicity assay, we observed the lowest LC50 values for each extract when compared to the standard vincristine sulfate. Conclusion The current study indicates that the plant extracts have potential antioxidant, cytotoxic, hypoglycemic, sedative, and anxiolytic activities. Graphical abstract