Potential Anti-Atherosclerotic Compound Isolated from Acanthaster planci.

Methyl benzoate was isolated from the the outer layer of A. planci (APOL) and tested towards cytotoxicity to HepG2 cells and Luciferase assay. The compound was not toxic towards HepG2 cells with IC50 value of 150.71 +/- 11.31 mu g/ml. Methyl benzoate was screened with PPRE promoter to determine its ability as PPAR ligand and expressed the target gene with maximum fold change of range 3.5 to 4.0 at concentration 0.78 mu g/ml. The confirmation as PPAR. ligand was carried out with SRB-1 promoter and the positive results were obtained. The compound showed optimum expression higher than positive control used at 3.12 mu g/ml with almost 5.0 fold change. In addition, expression of Luciferase genes was higher than positive control even at lower concentration 0.39 mu g/ml. These results indicated that methyl benzoate from APOL have the potential as anti-atherosclerotic agent, might as well beneficial as pharmaceutical products to prevent atherosclerosis which should be further explored.