Abstract

Plant-derived substances have recently become of great interest owing to their versatile applications. According to Ncube et al. (2008) medicinal plants are the richest bio-resource of drugs of traditional systems of medicine, modern medicines, nutraceuticals, food supplements, folk medicines, pharmaceutical intermediates, and chemical entities for synthetic drugs. Therefore, Euphorbia regis-jubae (Webb & Berth), an endemic Moroccan medicinal herb, and also, widely used as food for camels and goats was subjected to a phytochemical screening of increasing polarity gradient (petroleum ether, iso-hexan, chloroform, ethanol, methanol, and distilled water). Furthermore, the chemical compositions of different solvent extracts were subjected to gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis and the aqueous extract was purchased to an acute and chronic toxicity using Wistar rats. The acute and chronic toxicity study showed no toxicity when up to 5 g/kg body weight is administered orally. Preliminary phytochemical analysis of E. regis-jubae (Webb & Berth) revealed the presence of phenol, tannin, steroids, flavonoids, alkaloids, and terpenoids. Further, the GC-MS analysis revealed some compounds which are biologically important.

Key words: Euphorbia regis-jubae, toxicity, phytochemical screening, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS).