In the master's thesis, we investigated the antifungal activity of extracts obtained from dried leaves, roots, and fruits of two invasive plant species in Slovenia - Phytolacca americana and P. acinosa. Extracts were prepared by ethanol extraction and tested for their antifungal activity against the following species: Alternaria alternata, Alternaria infectoria, Aspergillus flavus, Epicoccum nigrum, Botrytis cinerea, Fusarium poae and Fusarium oxysporum. We prepared 10% ethanol extracts, which were added to 2% PDA medium and fungal culture was directly applied to them. All treatments were repeated three times. Some extracts were shown to inhibit the growth of fungi, some to accelerate it. Extracts from P. acinosa leaves and P. americana fruits had the greatest inhibitory effect on fungal growth. With the help of these extracts as evidence of antifungal activity, we continued research and studied fungi that had a 60% or greater inhibitory effect on the growth of mycelium. Botrytis cinerea and Aspergillus flavus were the two most sensitive fungi to the extracts. Both fungi were grown on PDA medium with extracts at concentrations of 25%, 12.5%, 6.2%, 3.1%, 1.6%, 0.8% and we found that growth inhibition was concentration-dependent. The results showed that extracts obtained from P. acinosa leaves and P. americana fruits could potentially be used as biofungicides in agriculture and as alternatives to synthetic fungicides for inhibiting the growth of harmful fungi in the food industry.
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