Activities of Andrographis paniculata (AS201-01) Tablet on Cox-2 and Prostaglandin Expression of Placental of Plasmodium berghei Infected Mice

Background: placental malaria has ability to upregulate prostaglandin synthesis by increasing cy-clooxygenase-2 (cox-2) enzyme activity. cox-2 and prostaglandin have a role in causing uterine con-traction and therefore can cause abortion or preterm labor. tablet as201-01 containing the ethyl acetate fraction of andrographis paniculata was tested in vivo on pregnant mice infected with plasmodium berghei. as201-01 inhibited the growth of p. berghei, increased tgf-β expression, decreased tlr-4 expression and apoptosis index of placental tissue in p. berghei infected pregnant mice and thus pre-vented placental malaria complications. these effects were correlated with the decrease of cox-2 and prostaglandin expression. methods: twenty-four pregnant mice (balb/c) were divided into 4 groups (n=6). mice were main-tained at animal laboratory of institute of tropical disease, universitas airlangga, surabaya, indone-sia in 2016. g1 were uninfected pregnant mice, g2 untreated infected pregnant mice, g3 infected pregnant mice treated with as201-01, and g4 infected pregnant mice treated with dhp tablet. all infection groups (g2-g4) were inoculated with 1x106 of p. berghei parasite on day 9 of gestation and treated on day 11. all mice were terminated at day 15 of gestation, and placental tissue was collected. cytokine expression of cox-2 and prostaglandin were evaluated using immunohistochemistry. results: g3 was found to have lower cox-2 and prostaglandin expression compared to g4 and g2, but higher compared to g1. cox-2 and prostaglandin expression was significantly different among groups (p<0.001). conclusion: this study demonstrates the ability as201-01 tablets have to decrease cox-2 and pros-taglandin expression on placental of p. berghei infected mice and therefore eliminates the adverse ef-fects of placental malaria.