In silico Evaluation of Antimalarial from Bioactive Compounds of Bitter Melon (Momordica charantia L.) and Its Toxicity with Plasmodium falciparum Lactate Dehydrogenase (PfLDH) and Plasmepsin (Plm) Enzymes as Targets

Malaria is one of the important health problems in the world caused by intracellular obligate protozoa
of the genus plasmodium. P. falciparum causes the most severe infections and the highest mortality
rate. The previous in vivo and in vitro research of crude alkaloid on bitter melon fruit (Momordica
charantia L.) can prove antimalarial activity in P. Falciparum but the active compound which suitable
for this activity is unknown yet. This study aims to evaluate in silico of twenty-five (25) bioactive
compounds of bitter melon (Momordica charantia L.) as an inhibitor of the PfLDH and Plasmepsin
enzymes. The PfLDH enzyme catalyzes the conversion of pyruvate to lactate which is a source of
energy for P. falciparum and the enzyme plasmepsin works by degrading hemoglobin to be a food
source. The method used is molecular docking with software PLANTS, YASARA, MarvinSketch, and
visualization using VMD, PyMOL and YASARA. As a positive control, Hoslundal is used as a PfLDH
inhibitor and Pepstatin as a Plasmepsin inhibitor. The results obtained five (5) candidates for active
compounds as PfLDH inhibitors, namely cucurbitine, α-elaeostearic acid, gentisic acid, galacturonic
acid and momordol with very low toxicity and there is no active compound candidates as Plasmepsin
inhibitors.