Essential oils as alternative antimicrobials: current status

Abstract

It is becoming increasingly difficult to treat bacterial infections with conventional antibiotics as resistance increases with time. Common antibiotics have been irrationally used in the general community, which has resulted in the selection of antibiotic-resistant genes. Despite various modifications that have been done to restore the antimicrobial activities of conventional antibiotics against an array of multi-drug resistant (MDR) strains, it has been unattainable to overcome this hurdle for a long time. Parallelly, the search for a new and alternative drug has become a high priority in every part of the world. In the last two decades, immense interest has grown in natural products as alternative therapeutics due to their lower toxicity, chemical group diversity and biochemical specificity, which are the upper hand compared to antibiotics. Essential oils are naturally found phytochemicals obtained from approximately 60 families of plants. These are composed of 20 to 60 different bioactive components at different concentrations and have already been reported for their antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral, anti-parasitic, insecticidal activities, antioxidant and antiseptic properties. This review focuses on antimicrobial activities, detailed mode of action and the latest progress in the research on the essential oil.