Vol. 2, Issue 5, Part L (2016)

Abstract
Tuberculosis (TB), an infectious disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis, still continues to be the biggest infectious threat to mankind. The present havoc due to global resurgence of TB, and the emergence of multi-drug resistant (MDR)-TB in India makes the search for alternative anti-tubercular phytomedicines an absolute mandate. As a fresh preparation of crude aqueous garlic extract (AGE) was earlier found to be bactericidal against M. smegmatis having similar cell-wall structure-composition as the pathogenic M. tuberculosis at a minimal bactericidal concentration (MBC) of 60 mg/ml, and the same confirmed by biochemical assays and micro-RNA (mi-RNA) expression studies, the present work involves immuno-molecular studies on the differential expression of NF-κB, a transcription factor involved in cellular immunobiological responses to foreign stimuli such as bacterial and viral antigens, in murine peritoneal-macrophages infected respectively with untreated, alive M. smegmatis (positive control) and M. smegmatis treated with crude AGE (at 60 mg/ml) (experimental) by SDS PAGE-Western Blot techniques. Significantly, a prominent band of NF-κB was observed in the lane of macrophages infected with untreated, alive M. smegmatis, indicating up-regulation of NF-κB gene expression there following the pathogen invasion, as compared to the macrophages infected with crude AGE-treated (at 60 mg/ml) M. smegmatis, thus confirming the mycobactericidal potency of aqueous garlic extract. Data obtained out of biochemical assays carried out for the determination of specific activities of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) enzymes from the same set of macrophage samples, which showed prominent induction of these two enzymes in case of macrophages infected with untreated, alive M. smegmatis with respect to macrophages infected with crude AGE-treated (at 60 mg/ml) M. smegmatis, also substantiated the same.