456 www.bsmiab.org/jabet Abdel-Motleb et al., J Adv Biotechnol Exp Ther. 2022 Sep; 5(3): 456-472 Chemical characterization, antimicrobial, antioxidant and larvicidal activities of certain fungal extracts Asmaa Abdel-Motleb 1 * , Mosad A. Ghareeb 2 , Mohamed S. Abdel-Aziz 3 , Maha A.M. El-Shazly 2 1 Environmental Research and Medical Malacology Division, Theodor Bilharz Research Institute, Kornish El-Nile, Warrak El-Hadar, Imbaba, Giza 12411, Egypt 2 Medicinal Chemistry Department, Theodor Bilharz Research Institute, Kornish El-Nile, Warrak El-Hadar, Imbaba, Giza 12411, Egypt 3 Microbial Chemistry Department, Biotechnology Research Institute, National Research Centre, Egypt ABSTRACT Fungal extracts are considered a promising source of bioactive compounds that represent the basic core of the drug industry. This study aimed at exploring the antimicrobial, antioxidant and larvicidal activities of three ethyl acetate extracts of three fungal isolates Fusarium oxysporum, Aspergillus fumigatus and Penicilluim griseofulvum. These fungi were isolated from sediment samples collected in water courses of three Egyptian governorates; Giza, Qalubeya and Gharbeya, during a year from January to December 2019, molecularly identified using 18Sr RNA technique and were grown on rice medium for 14 days and extracted with ethyl acetate. GC-MS examination of the extracts led to identification of 15, 29 and 24 compounds, respectively. Hexadecanoic acid was detected as a main component in the investigated extracts. Moreover, in Folin-Ciocalteu’s assay, the tested fungal extracts showed noticeable total phenolic contents (TPCs) values of 115.84, 88.24 and 73.22, respectively for Aspergillus fumigatus, Penicillium griseofulvum and Fusarium oxysporum. Additionally, Aspergillus fumigatus extract exhibited strong total antioxidant capacity (TAC) value of 409.46 mg AAE/g dry extract, followed by Penicillium griseofulvum and Fusarium oxysporum extracts with TAC values of 299.28 and 281.31 mg AAE/g dry extract, respectively. All extracts exhibited antimicrobial activities against Staphylococcus aureus (G+ve bacterium), Escherichia coli (G-ve bacterium), Candida albicans (yeast) and Aspergillus niger (Fungus). Also, the extracts showed high larvicidal activity against miracidia and cercariae of Schistosoma mansoni. In conclusion, Fusarium oxysporum, Aspergillus fumigatus and Penicilluim griseofulvum are excellent sources of bioactive compounds which have multiple biological effects. INTRODUCTION The phenomenon of oxidative stress caused by over-production of free radicals inside human body leads to many serious diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular, and inflammation. Moreover, the harmful effects of this phenomenon can be reduced via using naturally occurring antioxidant compounds as free radical scavengers [1-4]. Recently, pathogenic microbial strains have shown a great ability to resist antibiotics, which leads to the possibility of infection with numerous infectious diseases. Therefore, scientists turned to discovering new antimicrobial compounds from natural sources such as the secondary metabolites of fungi as an alternative to current antimicrobial agents [5-7]. Sediment fungi are a diverse group of organisms grow in extreme and unique habitats that provide them the capability to produce unique secondary metabolites which have various biological activities [8]. Fungi have appeared recently as novel antioxidants sources as a part of their bioactive secondary metabolites [9]. In addition to antioxidants, fungi exhibit various bioactivities and functions like; antifungal, antimicrobials and larvicidal activities [6,10]. Fusarium, Aspergillus, and Penicillium species are the most famous producers of biologically active secondary metabolites due to their ability to produce alkaloids, peptides, steroids, terpenoids, * Corresponding author Asmaa Abdel-Motleb Environmental Research and Medical Malacology Division, Theodor Bilharz Research Institute, Egypt e-mail: a_abdelmotlb@yahoo.com Academic editor Md Jamal Uddin, PhD ABEx Bio-Research Center, Dhaka 1230, Bangladesh Article info Received: 13 April 2022 Accepted: 15 May 2022 Published: 24 May 2022 Keywords Antimicrobial; Antioxidant; Aspergillus; Fusarium; Larvicidal; Penicilluim. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License, which permits unrestricted non- commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. ORIGINAL ARTICLE J Adv Biotechnol Exp Ther. 2022 Sep; 5(3): 456-472 eISSN: 2616-4760, https://doi.org/10.5455/jabet.2022.d128 Published by www.bsmiab.org