In vitro assessment of multipotential therapeutic importance of Hericium erinaceus mushroom extracts using different solvents

Abstract Infectious disease is one of the major threats to humans and it is the second leading cause of death worldwide, especially at present in which the Covid-19 and its modified variants. Edible mushrooms have many nutritional and medicinal values to human health. The medicinal properties of edible mushroom extract in inhibiting pathogenic microorganisms had advantages over the use of chemically synthetic antimicrobial compounds due to less unwanted side effects and can combat microbial resistance. The study hypothesized that the polarity affects the extraction quality of Hericium erinaceus mushroom which was prepared as fruiting bodies and subsequently affects its activity as an antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, and antiviral potential. So, the mushroom was quantitively evaluated to assess its content of flavonoids, alkaloids, tannins, saponins, carbohydrates, protein, nitrogen, and oil. The current research clarified here that aquatic extract has a significant activity as an antioxidant (IC50 = 53.7 µg/ml), and antiviral (IC50 = 24.97 µg/ml) while, ethyl acetate extract showed a reasonable antimicrobial activity rather than all tested extract against tested microorganisms. Unfortunately, all extracts under investigation possess low anti-inflammatory action according to the adopting protocol. The superior results of both water and ethyl acetate extracts were later investigated by HPTLC and GC-MS for preliminary prediction of the chemical constitution of those extracts. H. erinaceus mushroom succeeded to establish promising antimicrobial, antiviral, and antioxidant activities while it has low ani-inflammatory activity. Both HPTLC and GC-MS could identify the chemical constituents of the mushroom crude extract.