European Journal of Anatomy

Official Journal of The Spanish Society of Anatomy
Cover Volume 14 - Number 2
Eur J Anat, 14 (2): 83-89 (2010)

Some effects of the aqueous leaf extract of Datura metel on the frontal cortex of adult Wistar rats (Rattus norvegicus)

Damilare A. Adekomi, A.A. Tijani, O.K. Ghazal

Department of Human Anatomy, Faculty of Basic Medical Sciences, University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria.

ABSTRACT Datura has been documented as a plant with hallucinogenic properties. Although it has a reputation as one of the ??darker?? hallucino gens, historically it has been widely used by societies in both the Old and New World, and indeed continues to be used today. It is one of the drugs of abuse in Nigeria; young people add the decoction (of the leaves or the fruit) of the plant to their drinks in order to get ??high?. This is because it is cheap and readily available in comparison with to marijuana. The alkaloids present in the plant have been in demand in the past and its application as a subject for botanical and medical research is vast. The aim of this study is to highlight some of the effects of aqueous leaf extracts of Datura metel on the frontal cortex of adult Wistar rats. Twenty wistar rats were used for this study. The treatment groups consisted of 3 subgroups designated A, B, and C and these were given 200 mg/kg, 150 mg/kg and 100 mg/kg bwt of the extract respectively, while the control group, designated D, received equal volumes of phosphate buffered saline (PBS). Administration was performed once daily over seven days using an orogastric tube. Twentyfour hours after the last administration, all the animals were sacrificed by cervical dislocation. The brains were carefully extracted from the skulls of the animals and fixed in 10% formol calcium for histological examination. Special staining techniques such as Cresyl fast violet (CFV) and Feulgen DNA were employed followed by routine hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) stain. It was observed from this study that the administration of aqueous extracts of Datura metel (at the doses administered) had deleterious effects on the frontal cortex of adult albino Wistar rats. There were vacuolations in the stroma of the brains of the rats in the extract treatment group and the degree of vacuolation was dose-dependent.

Keywords: Datura metel, Cresyl fast violet, Frontal cortex, Vacuolations, Alkaloids

European Journal of anatomy
ISSN 2340-311X (Online)