Antimicrofouling properties of chosen marine plants: An eco-friendly approach to restrain marine microfoulers

Biofouling is a panic issue in the marine environment where the major perpetrator is the biofilm forming microbial cells like bacterial groups. Hence, the present study was focused to study the diversity and density of marine biofilm forming bacteria on different experimental panels immersed in Palk Bay region. The results are inferred that the density and distribution of biofilm forming bacterial groups were significantly (P<0.05) varied, whereas the Pseudomonas spp. (15.78–22.22%) had maximum distribution in the immersed all the test panels. The current antifouling paints create toxic effects on non-target organisms. Of late, natural products were replaced with current toxic antifouling problems. In the present study, the four marine plants viz. two seaweeds (Sarconema furcellatum, Sargassum wightii) species and two seagrasses (Syringodium isoetifolium, Cymodocea serrulata) species were selected to screen their antimicrofouling activity. From this, the crude acetone extract of S. furcellatum exhibited the good antimicrofouling activity over the other marine plant extracts against test microfoulers; antibacterial (7±0.16 to 13±0.26 mm) with least concentration of MIC and MBC values (12.5–25 µg/ml and 25–50 µg/ml), antimicroalgal (50–300 µg/ml) and Artemia cytotoxicity (LC50 133.88 µg/ml; P<0.001) and anticrustacen activity was significantly (P<0.05) increased mortality with increasing test concentrations of crude extracts. Also, phytochemical studies of the four marine plants revealed the presence of chemical constituents such as flavanoids, alkaloids, phenols and sugars. Further studies on the purification and identification of active compounds from S. furcellatum might help to characterize the nature of eco-friendly antifouling compounds filed study.