Antimalarial Activity of Mahagony Seed Ethanolic Extract in BALB/c Mice Infected with Plasmodium berghei ANKA and The Correlation of Parasitemia and Plasma Level of IFN-γ

Introduction: The genus of Plasmodium is a parasite that can cause malaria. Interferon gamma (IFN-γ) is a inflammatory sitokin, that can control Plasmodium in the blood. World Health Organization (WHO) recommends Artemisinin-based Combination Therapies (ACTs) to treat malaria. However, some ethnic communities in Indonesia still consume herbal, one of which is mahogany seeds. Its effect on the immune system has not been much explained. Materials and Methods: Twenty-five male BALB/c mice were infected with Plasmodium berghei ANKA and divided into 5 groups. Groups I-III were treated with mahagony seeds ethanolic extract (MSEE) at the concentrations of 100%, 50% and 25% respectively. Group IV was a negative control (NC) which was treated with 0.5% sodium carboxymethyl cellulose (CMCNa). Group V was a positive control (PC) which was treated with dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine (DHP) at 187.2 mg/kgBW. Treatments were given for four consecutive days. Parasitemia was observed every day from the first day to the fourth day post infection. Plasma level of IFN-γ were measured by Sandwich ELISA. Results: Two way ANOVA analysis showed a significant difference in parasitemia based on the treatment day (p=0.000) and the treatment group (p=0.000) in infected mice. Treatment of MSEE showed a significant effect on plasma level of IFN-γ (p=0.032) in infected mice. Spearmen’s rho bivariate correlation test showed a significant positive correlation between parasitemia on the fourth day post treatment and plasma level of IFN-γ (p=0.006; r=0.589). Conclusion: Antimalarial activity of MSEE was shown by the decreased of parasitemia along with the decreased of IFN-γ level on the day 4 post infection in a concentration dependent manner.