Abstract
Annona muricata is highly valued for its medicinal use. All parts of Annona muricata are used in traditional medicine by people who live in tropical areas, with the leaves, stem bark, roots, and seeds primarily used as medicinal ingredients. The leaf extract have some hepatoprotective and anti-inflammatory effect, it is also important in treating insomnia and cancer, the seeds are used to treat parasitic infections while the fruit is used to treat diarrhea, neuralgia, heart and liver diseases. It has also been reported to treat rheumatism, arthritic pain, dysentery and skin rashes. Twenty(20) Adult Wistar rats of known weight were purchased from the animal holdings of Department of Anatomy and were also housed in the Department of Anatomy, University of Benin. The animals were allowed to acclimatize for a period of two weeks before commencement of experiment. Annonna muricata leaves were harvested from the University of Benin Farm project, Benin City. The plant was identified at Herbarium of the Department of Plant Biotechnology, Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Benin. The leaves were thoroughly washed to remove sand and dust particles after which they were taken to the Pharmacology Department for the preparation of the extract. In preparation of the extract, the leaves were chopped into bits and dried at room temperature and pounded with mortar and pestle and then blended into fine powder with an electric blender. A portion of the powder was soaked in 2L distilled water for 24hrs and filtered to separate filtrate from residue. The rats were categorized into 4 groups(A,B,C & D) GroupA, control; GroupB, 5mg/kg body weight of mercury chloride only; GroupC, 500mg/kg body weight of extract + 5mg/kg body weight of mercury chloride; GroupD, 1000mg/kg body weight of extract+5mg mercury chloride; At the end of 28days experimental period, the rats were sacrificed under. A midline incision was made through the ventral wall of the abdomen of the rats. The liver was removed and fixed in 10% buffered formalin for histological analysis. The result obtained showed that mercuric chloride caused fatty impregnation on the liver and hepatocyte degeneration. This feature was not seen in the liver slides of rats treated with mercuric chlorideand A.muricata extract. The extract therefore mitigated against the effect of mercuric chloride on the liver.
