Effect of Hydro Alcoholic Leaf Extract of Myrtus communis on Pituitary- Gonad Axis in Adult Male Rat

Myrtus communis has been identified as a holy plant for ages and a great verity of medicinal properties have been described for it in literature. Today, there is a number of Myrtus drugs in Iran market including: Myrtoplex cream, Myrtex Solution, Aftoplex, Dineh Inhaler Powder, Rectol cream and so on. These in complete sentence properties may be due to the presence of different chemical compounds such as Tanin, Flavinoid, Saponin, Ascorbic acid, 1,8-Cineole, Myricetin and Delta-cadinene.Since Myrtus communis is used to treat sexual impotent in some areas, the present study was performed to evaluate the effect of hydro alcoholic Myrtus communis leaf extract on pituitary – gonad axis in adult male rat. Forty adult male rats wistar strain were selected and randomly divided into five groups; control(n=8) which received no treatment, sham which received distilled water as a solvent(n=8), and three experimental groups (1,2and3) (n=8 for each of group ) which received 0.75, 1.5and 3 mg/kg Myrtus communis leaf extract respectively. The extracts were delivered through meal for 21 days. After the last prescription of extract, the animal were unconscious and a blood was taken blood from their heart. Then considered the concentration of FSH, LH and testosterone by radio immunoassay (RIA) method. The obtained results were analyzed based on spss, Excel, one –way variance and post-hoc statistical programs , and significant at the level (p<0.05) take in consideration. The results of hormonal examination indicated the addition of 1.5 and 3 mg/kg body weights of myrtus communis leaf extract showed a significant increase in the level of testosterone (p<0.05) but concentration of LH, FSH hormones showed no significant difference. The Myrtus communis leaf extract causes an increase in the testosterone hormone ,that probably is related the compounds as Flavinoid, Ascorbic acid and Myricetin (by inhibition of aromatase activity) , Linoleic acid, Oleic acid and Palmitic acid (by inhibition 5alpha reductase activity) and 1,8-Cineole, Delta-cadinene (the cytochrome-P450 Inducer).