## 3 Results and Discussion
### Antioxidant Activity by DPPH Method  
To evaluate the radical scavenging activity using the DPPH method, five concentrations (10 mg/mL, 5 mg/mL, 2.5 mg/mL, 1 mg/mL and 0.5 mg/mL) were prepared from each ethanolic extract of the nine samples tested (Table 6). In parallel, the antioxidant activity of five ascorbic acid solutions prepared at different concentrations (0.06-0.16 mg/mL) was also evaluated as a positive control, resulting in 94.54% inhibition at the highest concentration tested (0.16 mg/mL). The IC50 (concentration of each extract causing 50% DPPH inhibition) was then calculated and expressed in mg/mL (Table 6, Figure 1). The maximum radical scavenging activity for all samples was recorded at the highest concentration (10 mg/mL), as shown in Table 6. In the case of AS and ALC samples, higher \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{3}{*}{
\begin{tabular}{c} **Concentration** \\ **(mg/mL)** \\ \end{tabular} } & \multirow{3}{*}{**PS**} & \multirow{3}{*}{**PC**} & \multirow{3}{*}{**PT**} & \multirow{3}{*}{**LMS**} & \multirow{3}{*}{**LML**} & \multirow{3}{*}{**LMC**} & \multirow{3}{*}{**AS**} & \multirow{3}{*}{**ALC**} & \multirow{3}{*}{**AP**} & \multicolumn{3}{c}{**Acorbic Acid**} \\  & & & & & & & & & & & **Comcentration** & **(mg/mL)** & **\% Inhibition** \\ \hline
10 & 63.65 & 58.91 & 82.93 & 84.57 & 84.09 & 80.77 & 96.00 & 97.00 & 80.08 & 0.16 & 94.54 \\ \hline
5 & 52.07 & 47.89 & 80.52 & 64.45 & 80.02 & 71.33 & 87.51 & 86.40 & 77.68 & 0.14 & 82.32 \\ \hline
2.5 & 46.23 & 44.50 & 64.85 & 54.44 & 75.06 & 65.76 & 84.36 & 84.70 & 70.38 & 0.10 & 65.24 \\ \hline
1 & 30.34 & 33.55 & 56.86 & 50.25 & 53.76 & 55.31 & 55.77 & 50.90 & 50.89 & 0.08 & 45.48 \\ \hline
0.5 & 24.89 & 21.76 & 37.77 & 36.34 & 36.39 & 37.15 & 32.30 & 30.09 & 30.40 & 0.06 & 25.22 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 6: The DPPH radical scavenging activity (% inhibition) of ethanolic extracts vs. ascorbic acid. Figure 1: Concentration dependency of radical scavenging activity of the samples. values were obtained than in the case of the control sample, ascorbic acid, analyzed in the concentration range 0.06-0.16 mg/mL. At the 5 mg/mL concentration, except for the PS, PC, and LMS samples, the other samples gave values similar to those recorded for ascorbic acid. The next two lower concentrations (2.5 mg/mL and 1 mg/mL) still showed a high percentage of DPPH inhibition. This was true for all samples except PS and PC. However, the values recorded are comparable to those recorded for ascorbic acid. At the lowest concentration tested (0.3 mg/mL), the antioxidant activity showed a significant decrease for all the samples, with values comparable to those recorded for ascorbic acid and even higher for some of the samples. The DPPH inhibition percentage at 10 mg/mL concentration was >90% for AS and ALC, >80% for PT, LMS, LML, CML, and AP, and >50% for PS and PC. At 5 mg/mL, it was >80% for PT, CML, AS, and ALC, >70% for CML and AP, >50% for PS and LMS, and <50% for PC. At a concentration of 2.5 mg/mL, >80% was recorded for AS and ALC, >50% for PT, LMS, LML, and AP, and PS and PC had DPPH values < 50%. At 1 mg/mL, values > 50% were recorded for all samples except PS and PC. At the lowest concentration, values > 30% were recorded except for the PS and PC samples. Table 6 shows the IC50 values (the extract concentration that determines 50% DPPH inhibition) obtained for the samples analyzed, in comparison with the value obtained for the control sample, ascorbic acid. IC50 values (Table 7) ranged from 1669 mg/mL for the AS sample (highest antioxidant capacity) to 3979 mg/mL (lowest antioxidant capacity) in the case of the PC sample. The variation of the IC50 values of the analyzed samples is shown in Figure 1.  
Figure 1 shows the dependence of free radical reducing activity on the concentration of the extracts analyzed. A high antioxidant potential is shown by samples that register high inhibition at low concentration.