Abstract
Oily fraction was extracted from the water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) using n-hexane by both cold and hot extraction in 5.5 +/- 0.05% and 9.30 +/- 0.05%, respectively, however, no difference was found in the nature of the compounds extracted by the two processes. The analysis of this oil was carried out using GC-FID and GC-MS in separate experiments and the nature of the compounds was investigated by library matching of the spectra obtained through GC-MS. This extract was found to contain 33.267% of the nonadecan-4-ol and 20.51% of a long chain ketone in addition to various quantities of the long chain nitrogenous compounds. The antibacterial activity of the extract was investigated against eight pathogenic bacteria and fungus Candida albican using disc diffusion method. The extract was found to be highly active against all tested bacterial strains except S. typhi. For most of the strains the activity of the extract was near the reference. Ciprofloxacin, clotrimazole and erythromycin were used as reference antibiotics.