In vivo sedative and cytotoxic activities of methanol extract of leaves of Crataeva nurvala Buch-Ham.

The present study was designed to investigate the sedative and cytotoxic activities of a crude methanol extract of leaves of Crataeva nurvala Buch-Ham. Sedative activity was evaluated by using hole cross, open field and Elevated-Plus Maze (EPM) tests at 400 mg kg(-1) body weight. The crude extract decreased the locomotor activity of mice in hole cross, open field and EPM tests. The cytotoxic activity of this extract was determined by brine shrimp lethality bioassay where the LC50 value was found to be 55.46 microg mL(-1) as compared to that of 0.451 microg mL(-1) exhibited by standard vincristine sulphate. The result shows that the crude extract of the leaves of C. nurvala have significant (* p < 0.05) sedative and cytotoxic activities.