Youssif K.A.Haggag E.G.Elshamy A.M.Rabeh M.A.Gabr N.M.Seleem A.Alaraby Salem M.Hussein A.S.Krischke M.Mueller M.J.Abdelmohsen U.R.Department of PharmacognosyFaculty of PharmacyModern University for Technology and InformationCairoEgypt; Department of PharmacognosyFaculty of PharmacyHelwan UniversityCairoEgypt; Department of PharmacognosyFaculty of PharmacyCairo UniversityCairoEgypt; Department of PharmacologyNational Research CentreCairoEgypt; Department of Pharmaceutical ChemistryOctober University for Modern Sciences and Arts (MSA)CairoEgypt; Julius-von-Sachs-Institute of BiosciencesBiocenterPharmaceutical BiologyUniversity of W�rzburgW�rzburgGermany; Department of PharmacognosyFaculty of PharmacyMinia UniversityMiniaEgypt; Department of PharmacognosyFaculty of PharmacyDeraya UniversityUniversities ZoneNew Minia CityMiniaEgypt2020-01-092020-01-09201919326203https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0223781PubMed ID 31693694https://t.ly/dOgXrScopusThe green synthesis of silver nanoparticles (SNPs) using plant extracts is an eco-friendly method. It is a single step and offers several advantages such as time reducing, cost-effective and environmental non-toxic. Silver nanoparticles are a type of Noble metal nanoparticles and it has tremendous applications in the field of diagnostics, therapeutics, antimicrobial activity, anticancer and neurodegenerative diseases. In the present work, the aqueous extracts of aerial parts of Lampranthus coccineus and Malephora lutea F. Aizoaceae were successfully used for the synthesis of silver nanoparticles. The formation of silver nanoparticles was early detected by a color change from pale yellow to reddish-brown color and was further confirmed by transmission electron microscope (TEM), UV�visible spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, dynamic light scattering (DLS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and energy-dispersive X-ray diffraction (EDX). The TEM analysis of showed spherical nanoparticles with a mean size between 12.86 nm and 28.19 nm and the UV- visible spectroscopy showed ?max of 417 nm, which confirms the presence of nanoparticles. The neuroprotective potential of SNPs was evaluated by assessing the antioxidant and cholinesterase inhibitory activity. Metabolomic profiling was performed on methanolic extracts of L. coccineus and M. lutea and resulted in the identification of 12 compounds, then docking was performed to investigate the possible interaction between the identified compounds and human acetylcholinesterase, butyrylcholinesterase, and glutathione transferase receptor, which are associated with the progress of Alzheimer�s disease. Overall our SNPs highlighted its promising potential in terms of anticholinesterase and antioxidant activity as plant-based anti-Alzheimer drug and against oxidative stress. � 2019 Youssif et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.Englishacetylcholinesterasecholinesteraseglutathione transferase receptorLampranthus coccineus extractMalephora lutea extractmethanolplant extractreceptorsilver nanoparticleunclassified drugwateradultaerial plant partAizoaceaeAlzheimer diseaseanimal experimentanimal modelanimal tissueantioxidant activityArticlecolorcontrolled studydrug identificationdrug screeningdrug synthesisenzyme inhibitionLampranthus coccineusmaleMalephora luteametabolomicsmolecular dockingneuroprotectionnonhumanoxidative stressparticle sizeratArticlehttps://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0223781PubMed ID 31693694