Liver disease has become one of the major health problems in the world, and the death rate is going rapidly to increase. Oxidative stress plays a crucial role in the emerging, development and the progression of liver diseases. Ethnobotanical research has an undoubted profound impact on the development of numerous new drugs. The aim of this research, therefore, was to examine the antioxidant activities of 14 selected plants used for treating liver diseases by traditional healers of Indonesia ethnicities and to classify these plants using chemometrics of principal component analysis (PCA). The extraction using methanol as the solvent was performed with two stages maceration. Total phenolic and flavonoid compounds were determined by Folin-Ciocalteau and AlCl3 method respectively, whereas antioxidant activities were estimated using DPPH free radical scavenging, trolox equivalent antioxidant capacity (TEAC), and ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) assay. Among 19 methanol extracts of 14 plants, the leaves of Baccaurea racemose, Macaranga subpeltata, and Piper sp. showed the highest antioxidant properties. The phenolics contents correlated with TEAC, FRAP, and DPPH radical scavenging activity, while flavonoid did not significantly affect these antioxidant activities. Principal component analysis (PCA) successfully classified the plant samples using the variables of antioxidant activities and phenolic-flavonoid contents. The selected plants have promising antioxidant properties which support their utilization for either liver diseases medication or oxidative stress-related diseases prevention.
Key words: antioxidant activity, flavonoid, phenolic, medicinal plant, traditional healer, principal component analysis
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