Mitigating Newcastle Disease Virus Pathogenesis with Allicumin: A Potenting Approach

Abstract

Newcastle disease virus (NDV) is a virus that causes a deadly infection in many kinds of birds, and mild flu-like symptoms in humans but due to the frequent loss in potency and significant cases of reversion associated with Newcastle disease vaccine, prophylaxis from botanical origin could be a major breakthrough in controlling the ugly situations of this disease. This study was undertaken to evaluate the prophylactic potentials of Allicumin preparations against Newcastle virus. Allicumin was prepared by mixing equal volume of curcumin and allicin extracted from Curcuma longa (turmeric) and Allium sativum (garlic) respectively using solvent extraction and fractionation methods. The effects of Allicumin on embryonic weights/ egg weights ratio (EE), mean death time (MDT) and EE neutralization (EEN) using embryonic egg model. The data obtained was analyzed using one way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and student “t” test. The study revealed that viral preparation diluted with 5 ml phosphate buffer saline (PBS) was virulent, exhibited significant (p < 0.05) pathological features with Mean Death Time (MDT) of 56 h. The weight (EMW) of the embryonic infected egg (4.17 g) increased to 5.92 g, 4.72 g, 5.98 g, 5.18 g, 6.21 g and 6.28 when protected with turmeric extract (B), garlic extract (C), turmeric + garlic extract (D), allicin (E), curcumin (F) and allicumin (G) respectively when compared to normal control (H) with EMW OF 6.31 g after 2 days. The growing embryo in the infected eggs died after 3 days contrary to the protected eggs. There was significant (p < 0.05) increase in the EE and EE index among the protected eggs after 2 days, and this was recorded most among the eggs protected with allicumin. This study has shown that Allicumin preparation provided effective protection of chick embryo against NDV.