RESEARCH ARTICLE Prosanta Pal et.al / UJPSR / 1 (1), 2015, 1-9 Department of Pharmacognosy e ISSN: 2454-3764 Print ISSN: 2454-3756 www.ujpsr.com 1st Issue 1 PHYTOCHEMICAL ANALYSIS OF THE WHOLE PLANT OF Mimosa pudica (Linn.) 1 Prosanta Pal*, 2 Supriya Datta, 1 Hema Basnett, 1 Bupendra Shrestha, 1 Jyochhana Priya Mohanty 1 Department of Pharmacognosy, Himalayan Pharmacy Institute of Pharmacy, Majhitar, Rangpo, E. Sikkim – 737136, INDIA 2 Department of Pharmacognosy, Bengal College of Pharmaceutical sciences and Research, Bidhan Nagar, Durgapur-713212, INDIA INTRODUCTION Chemical diversity in natural product is an immensely rich source of new pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, agrochemicals and other economically important chemicals. Therapeutic potentials of herbal drug ranges from parts of plants, through simple extracts to isolated active constituents. Phytochemical evaluation compresses of different chemical tests and chemical assay. The isolation, purification and identification of active constituents are chemical methods of evaluation. The phytochemical evaluation also covers phytochemical screening carried out for establishing chemical profile of crude drug. The purity of crude drugs is ascertained by quantitative estimation of active chemical constituents present in them. The method may be useful in determining single active constituents or the group of related constituents present in the same drug. The spectrophotometric analysis using UV/ visible/ IR/ Fluorescence/ NMR/ Mass/ X-ray diffraction are physical methods of assay. The modern techniques like HPTLC, HPLC, GC, LCMS, GCMS are becoming popular in the field of molecular research, because:  Most versatile, safest, dependable, efficient, fast test and sensitive chromatogram.  Improved data processing capabilities.  Identification, quantification finger printing of drug molecule.  Detection of adulterant [1,2,3]. Abstract Mimosa pudica (Linn.) is a creeping annual or perennial herb. It has been identified as lajjalu in Ayurveda and has been found to have antiasthmatic, aphrodisiac, analgesic, and antidepressant properties. M. pudica is known to possess sedative, emetic, and tonic properties, and has been used traditionally in the treatment of various ailments including alopecia, diarrhea, dysentery, insomnia, tumor, and various urogenital infections. As the whole plant being used to cure various diseases so we have extracted all the plant constituents from whole plant powder of Mimosa pudica (Linn.) using 50% ethanol following cold maceration technique. Preliminary phytochemical evaluation showed the presence ofcarbohydrates, alkaloids, proteins, amino acids, tannins, phenolics, flavonoids, steroids, fixed oil, mucilage and saponins. Among these compounds alkaloid was found to exhibit different pharmacological properties. So later we have separated and identified the alkaloids present in the 50% ethanolic whole plant extract and its fractions. Key words Mimosa pudica (Linn.), phytochemical, alkaloids. ARTICLE INFO: Article history: Received: 1 April 2015 Received in revised form: 15 May 2015 Accepted: 15 June 2015 Available online: 15 July 2015 Corresponding Author : Prosanta Pal Department of Pharmacognosy Himalayan Pharmacy Institute Majhitar, E. Sikkim, INDIA Email: rosanta_pal@rediffmail.com Phone: +91-7602893704