In Vitro Antischistosomal Activity of the Argemone mexicana Methanolic Extract and Its Main Component Berberine

Schistosomiasis has been identified as a major public health problem in tropical countries. The present study aimed to investigate the schistosomicidal effects of the methanolic extract of L. and its active component, berberine against on in-vitro experiments. adults were used. Various concentrations of the methanolic extract (10 - 200 μg/ml) and berberine (2.5 - 50 μM) were tested from 24 to 72 h. The viability of was confirmed with an invertoscope-microscope. Furthermore, cytotoxic (Hemolysis test), and antioxidant (DPPH radical scavenging assay) capacities were determined. The viability tests on showed that at 50 μg/mL is lethal at 48 h and berberine at 10 μM is lethal at 24 h. The hemolytic activity at 1,000 μg/mL was 2.9% for and 90.2% for berberine. The antioxidant capacities shown by and berberine, were EC 156.3 and 84.1 μg/mL, respectively. The extract of and berberine demonstrated high antischistosomal activities in low concentration and short exposure time on the in-vitro model.