Novel Optimization of Psidium guajava Antibacterial Activity for Drug Discovery and Development

Developing a new antibiotic is difficult, with an estimated failure rate of 95%, the primary value of new antibiotics is to treat multi-drug resistant infections and provide a protective benefit against emerging pathogens, natural products serves as an infinite resource for drug development, exploring natural resources for drug discovery and development may represent advantages compared to some other approaches. Rather focusing on isolation and concentration of the bioactive molecules in medicinal plants, other synthetic reactions can be done with the crude extract of medicinal plants before it isolation, concentration and purification. This study aim to develop new strategies for optimizing antimicrobial property guava leave extract by simple reactions, either by self-reaction or combination reaction with a reagent/a drug/a different plant extract. Seven (7) different combinatory samples were made, FTIR analysis revealed conjugation and formation of new functional group(s) which was further confirmed by weight analysis of the prepared samples, two preparations successfully inhibit the growth of multi-drug resistant clinical isolates of S.aureaus and E.Coli making the two preparations a broad spectrum antimicrobial, thus, showing that reacting plant extract alone or with another compound can effectively optimize its antimicrobial activities. Exploring this method in antifungal, anti-inflammatory, antiviral and anticancer drug discovery, considering the availability and vast types of natural products present in medicinal plants will create a new pathway for overcoming drug resistance threat worldwide.