Mulberries are a deciduous, fast-growing, versatile plant that are prized for their leaves, which
increased milk yield of dairy cows and served as the silkworms' primary food supply. The
leaves' high nutritional content and medicinal properties, such as its diuretic, hypoglycemic,
and hypotensive effects, are mostly ascribed to the flavonoids and antioxidants quercetin and
rutin. In this work, the Morus indica plant was productively propagated in vitro, and the
antioxidant activity of the donor and in vitro-raised plants was compared with respect to their
ability to scavenge free radicals (ABTS), reducing power, and total antioxidant activity. The
antioxidant activity of the stem and leaf extract was assessed. With a few modifications, the
plant has been grown in vitro utilising conventional tissue culture methods. Following the
successful in vitro replication process and the subsequent ex-vivo plant rearing, the stems and
leaves were harvested. After being Soxhlet extracted of these leaves and stems, the extracts
were subjected to ABTS radical scavenging activity (50-500 ?g/ml) assay. Additionally, the
total antioxidant activity and reducing power were calculated and assessed. The totalantioxidant activity, reducing power, and ABTS radical scavenging activity of the donor and in
vitro grown plants differed significantly, according to the results. There were significant
antioxidant capabilities in the donor plants. On the other hand, plants grown in vitro showed
greater scavenging abilities, reducing power and total antioxidant activity. These resultsimplied
that methods of in vitro propagation not only preserved but significantly improved Morus
indica's antioxidant capacity.
Keywords: Mulberry, Morus indica, Antioxidant, In vitro propagation, Total
antioxidant activity and Reducing power assay, etc.
Publication date: 01/01/2026
https://ijbpas.com/pdf/2026/January/MS_IJBPAS_2026_9776.pdf
Download PDF
https://doi.org/10.31032/IJBPAS/2026/15.1.9776
