Pathogens that can develop resistance to antimicrobial treatments has become a phenomenon extensively recorded over the last few years. Pathogens including Escherichia coli are dangerous to humans and are capable of resisting a variety of treatments. Treatments using clove (Syzygium aromaticum) essential oil and eugenol extracted from clove buds have been shown to deactivate Escherichia coli strains and to prevent the development of antimicrobial resistance. As pathogens such as Escherichia coli have concerned the medical world, it is crucial to attempt to find the most effective treatment, a comparison on the performance of these two treatments would be beneficial in finding this. Samples of clove oil and eugenol were applied to antibiotic disks and placed in agar plates inoculated with Escherichia coli. Plates with ampicillin and no treatment were prepared as well. These plates were stored in an incubator and taken out once three days each, the areas of the zones of inhibition were recorded and their averages were calculated, visual observations were written down as well. The eugenol plate demonstrated dense Escherichia coli growth and small zones of inhibition while the essential oil plate featured sparse growth, this could suggest that clove essential oil is more capable of inhibiting Escherichia coli growth, though it was theorized that the oil may have been thin enough to diffuse across its plate.

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