Antioxidant, antimicrobial, and DNA protection activities of some Tanacetum species and phenolic richness in their ethanolic extracts

Tanacetum species have been used traditionally for a long time due to their various biological activities such as anticoagulant, antimicrobial, cytotoxic, insecticidal, and antimigraine. In the present work, ethanolic extracts were prepared from aerial parts of four Tanacetum species (T. parthenifolium, T. chiliophyllum, T. balsamitoides, and T. zahlbruckneri) by Soxhlet Extraction Method; and 17 different phenolic concentrations of the extracts were determined by HPLC. Subsequently, antimicrobial effects were investigated with hollow agar method and in vitro antioxidant activities including total antioxidant activity, DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl), ABTS (2,2'-azino-bis (3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid)), radical scavenging activity, ferric iron (Fe³⁺), and cupric (Cu²⁺) reduction. Finally, protective effects on pBR322 plasmid DNA damaged by H₂O₂ using gel electrophoresis were investigated. Although a few phenolics were well known as antioxidant, it could not be detected in some of the extracts. The plant extracts however were generally found to have high phenolic content. In the antimicrobial studies, extracts of T. parthenifolium and T. zahlbruckneri did not have a lethal effect on S. cerevisiae. The extracts were also found to have powerful antioxidant properties. They exhibited similar activity with the standards, which are butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA), butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT), and α-tocopherol (α-Toc). In addition, they did not show useful effect on the damages of H₂O₂ and/or DMSO depending on the concentration. However, when extracts were applied alone, they partly stabilised the plasmid DNA. It was also observed that the high phenolic content of T. chiliophyllum extract had a positive effect on its antioxidant activity and DNA protective activity.