Biopreservative Potential of Lemon Grass (Cymbopogon citratus) Oil against Common Food Spoilage Fungi

Food spoilage fungi are becoming a global challenge to food storage and food safety, hence tons of food are lost annually to the activities of these fungi while consumption of spoilt food are dangerous to human health. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to assess the antifungal activities of lemon grass oil (Cymbopogon citratus) against some food spoilage fungi using different standard techniques such as dilution plating technique, colonial and morphological characterization. Oil extraction was done using fractional distillation method and biocompounds evaluation with GC-MS, antifungal activity, the minimum inhibitory (MI) and fungicidal concentrations (MFC) were determine using standard methods. Results show that five fungi were identified as Aspergillus niger, Penicillum sp., Aspergillus oryzae, Aspergillus flavusand Aspergillus terreus. The GC-MS of the oil detectscitral, citronellol, neral, geranial, limonene and geranyl acetate, flavonoids, alcohol and terpenoids. The oil was cidal to 100 % of the fungi at stock concentration. The minimum inhibitory concentrations against Aspergillus niger, Aspergillus oryzae and Aspergillus terreus was 0.781 μL/ml, Penicillumsp. 0.391μL/ml, and Aspergillus flavus, 6.25μL/ml. The MFC for Aspergillus nigerwas 1.563μL/ml, 0.781μL/ml for Penicillumsp and Aspergillus oryzae 6.25μL/ml for Aspergillus flavus and 1.563 μL/ml for Aspergillust erreus. Lemon grass oil extracted was active against common food spoilage fungi examined and could be a potential biopreservative and antifungal agent.