Antidepressant activity and HPTLC fingerprinting of stearic acid in different days of wheat seedlings

Abstract

Depression is a chronic, recurring and potentially life threatening illness and affects up to 20% of the world population and in the year 2020, depression will become the second most common disease in the world. To find the remedy from nutraceuticals, the present study was designed to evaluate the antidepressant activity of stearic acid (SA) and to quantify its maximum content in different dayold wheat seedlings and wheat grains. Forced swimming test (FST) and tail suspension test (TST) were done to evaluate the antidepressant activity of SA. HPTLC fingerprinting of SA was done in different days (3 , 5 and 7 d) of wheat seedlings and wheat grains to quantify its maximum content. In the antidepressant study, when compared with the control (326.67 ± 3.02 s), SA showed potential antidepressant activity in TST (131.67 ± 2.60 s) and SA also showed very good antidepressant activity in FST (124.83 ± 5.37 s) when compared with the control (215.83 ± 6.64 s). In HPTLC fingerprinting, the maximum content of SA was identified in 3-d-old wheat seedlings (89.43 μg) when compared to wheat grains (84.69 μg), 5-d-old (86.43 μg) and 7-d-old (85.32 μg) wheat seedlings. Hence, the present study concludes that SA has a potential antidepressant activity and 3-d-old wheat seedlings are the essential sources of SA among the different dayold wheat seedlings. Keywords: Depression, Forced swimming test, Tail suspension test, Stearic acid, HPTLC fingerprinting, 3-d-old wheat seedlings