Cited by 949Essential Oils and Antimicrobial ActivityInsect Pest Control StrategiesAntimicrobial agents and applications

Antimicrobial Properties of Plant Essential Oils against Human Pathogens and Their Mode of Action: An Updated Review

Open access
Swamy, Mallappa Kumara, Akhtar, Mohd Sayeed, Sinniah, Uma Rani·2016·Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Abstract

A wide range of medicinal and aromatic plants (MAPs) have been explored for their essential oils in the past few decades. Essential oils are complex volatile compounds, synthesized naturally in different plant parts during the process of secondary metabolism. Essential oils have great potential in the field of biomedicine as they effectively destroy several bacterial, fungal, and viral pathogens. The presence of different types of aldehydes, phenolics, terpenes, and other antimicrobial compounds means that the essential oils are effective against a diverse range of pathogens. The reactivity of essential oil depends upon the nature, composition, and orientation of its functional groups. The aim of this article is to review the antimicrobial potential of essential oils secreted from MAPs and their possible mechanisms of action against human pathogens. This comprehensive review will benefit researchers who wish to explore the potential of essential oils in the development of novel broad‐spectrum key molecules against a broad range of drug‐resistant pathogenic microbes.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1155/2016/3012462

Cites

162 of 162 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Some properties of essential oils such as anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, and antioxidant have been verified in the recent scientific literature.

    “Some of these properties of essential oils such as anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, and antioxidant have been verified in the recent scientific literature [14, 18–20].”

    From Chemical Composition, Total Phenolic Content, and Antioxidant Activities of the Essential Oils of the Leaves and Fruit Pulp of <i>Annona muricata</i> L. (Soursop) from Ghana (2019) · cites this paper as [20]

    Section 3.1 (page unavailable) reviews studies showing antimicrobial activity of essential oils. The copy does not substantiate anti-inflammatory activity; antioxidant activity appears in reference titles but is not discussed as a finding of this review. Thus this source supports only part of the cited sentence. (LLM, conf=0.88)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 4

  1. [48]Lawal O. A. Ogunwande I. A. Omikorede O. E. Hemical composition and antimicrobial activity of essential oil of Ocimum kilimandscharicum (R. Br.) Guerke: a new chemotype American Journal of Essential Oils and Natural Products 2014 2 1 41 46
  2. [80]Yousefbeyk F. Gohari A. R. Sourmaghi M. H. S. Chemical composition and antimicrobial activity of essential oils from different parts of Daucus littoralis Smith subsp. hyrcanicus Rech. F Journal of Essential Oil-Bearing Plants 2014 17 4 570 576 10.1080/0972060x.2014.901610 2-s2.0-84907273603 · DOI
  3. [111]Faleiro M. L. Méndez-Vilas A. The mode of antibacterial action of essential oils Science Against Microbial Pathogens: Communicating Current Research and Technological Advances 2011 Boca Raton, Fla, USA Brown Walker Press 1143 1156
  4. [126]Singh S. Das S. S. Singh G. Schuff C. de Lampasona M. P. Catalán C. A. N. Composition, in vitro antioxidant and antimicrobial activities of essential oil and oleoresins obtained from black cumin seeds (Nigella sativa L.) BioMed Research International 2014 2014 10 918209 10.1155/2014/918209 2-s2.0-84896825230 PMC3933240 24689064 · DOI

Authors
Swamy, M. K., Akhtar, M. S., & Sinniah, U. R.
Affiliations
Universiti Putra Malaysia (MY)
Corresponding author
  • Swamy, Mallappa Kumara
  • Akhtar, Mohd Sayeed
  • Sinniah, Uma Rani
Venue
Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2016-01
Volume
2016
Issue
1
Pages
3012462-3012462
ISSN
  • 1741-427X (ISSN-L)
  • 1741-4288
OpenAlex
W2560919346
Cited by
949
References
162
Citations by year
2026: 69 · 2025: 89 · 2024: 112 · 2023: 108 · 2022: 132 · 2021: 166 · 2020: 123 · 2019: 71 · 2018: 57 · 2017: 22
FWCI
5.73
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Universiti Putra Malaysia Institutional Repository (Universiti Putra Malaysia) (acceptedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
Funders
Universiti Putra Malaysia
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Food Science › Essential Oils and Antimicrobial Activity
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Plant Science › Insect Pest Control Strategies
  • Physical Sciences › Chemistry › Organic Chemistry › Antimicrobial agents and applications
Keywords
essential oils, antimicrobial activity, medicinal and aromatic plants, human pathogens, mechanism of action, pathogenic bacteria, fungal pathogens, viral pathogens, terpenes, phenolic compounds, aldehydes, drug-resistant bacteria, plant secondary metabolism

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review