The Inhibition of Water and Ethanol Extracts of Tamarind Leaves and Kunci Pepet Rhizomes on Pancreatic Lipase in Vitro.

Abstract

Tamarind and kunci pepet has been used traditionally as herbal medicine to reduce body weight or used as antiobesity. But the mechanism in vitro of this herbal in reducing body weight has not been known yet. The objective of this research is to evaluate the these herbal as antiobesity by their water and ethanol extracts capability in inhibiting pancreatic lipase activity in vitro at pH 8, incubation time 45 minutes, and temperature 40°C. Pancreatic lipase used in this research was human pancreatic lipase with concentration of 1.4×10-5 μg/μl and the substrate was sesame oil with concentration of 16.2 μg/μl. The water and ethanol extracts of tamarind leaves contained alkaloids, flavonoids, saponins, steroids, and tannins. Water extract of kunci pepet contained alkaloids, flavonoids, saponins, and tannins, while ethanol extract contained alkaloids, flavonoids, saponins, and triterpenoids. The results of tamarind leaves extracts showed that ethanol extract in concentration of 150 ppm had the highest inhibitory effect, with the value of 49.0%. Water extract of kunci pepet at concentration of 200 ppm had the highest inhibition, with the value of 65.1%. These values were higher than inhibitory effect of Xenical® 100 ppm as the positive control, with the inhibition value of 10.6%