Mathematical approach to analysis of therapeutic properties of four important flowers mentioned in Siribhoovalaya- An ancient Indian multilingual manuscript

Abstract

Pushpayurveda is considered to be a unique branch of ayurvedic medicine which was first conceived by Jain monks as early as 9^th century. Various ancient Indian manuscripts contain notes about the use of flowers for medicinal applications. The petals of flowers could be directly administered orally or can be made into the form of juice, decoction and or by mixing with other active ingredients. &lsquo;Siribhoovalaya&rsquo;, a multilingual literature written by Jain monk Kumudendu muni mentions the application of eight important flowers for the purification of mercury. In the present study, the antibacterial and antioxidant analysis of extracts of four of the eight mentioned flowers- Panasa, Padari, Kedige, Krishnapushpa was carried out. The results of antioxidant analysis were studied in detail with the help of modern mathematical software MATHEMATICA. Combination of all four flowers was found to be effective against <em>B. cereus</em>, <em>S. aureus</em> and <em>S. marcescenes</em>. The antioxidant activity was found reduced when a combination of the four flowers were used. The extract of Ketaki showed significantly higher antioxidant activity compared to all the other extracts. The whole study is carried out based on the standard tests of hypotheses, using ANOVA and the correlation effect is studied using regression models.