The metabonomic changes of leishmania major, s promastigotes (fredlin strain) after in vitro artemisinin treatment at stationary phase

 Introduction: Based on WHO classifications, leishmaniasis enumerates as one of the six important diseases in the tropics. It is also common in the Middle East and the Mediterranean countries. Control of the disease is important due to increased clinical cases in immune-system deficiency patients. With regard to the increasing need to new drugs with lesser side effects for the control and treatment of the disease, we surveyed the in vitro effects of artemisinin on the promastigotes of leishmania major, s metabolites in Pasteur institute of Iran. Materials and Methods: After IC50 determination, the effects of different concentrations of artemisinin drug were assessed on the metabolites of leishmania in two groups the control group (without drug reception in culture media) and the case group (with drug reception in culture media), by using NMR technique. Results: The results of this study indicate that in the metabolic changes in promastigotes of leishmania major (fredlin strain) at stationary phase, 5 metabolites of the 41 ones in the galactose metabolic cycle have shown significant changes. Therefore, galactose metabolism has changed the most, while sphingolipid, valine, leucine and isoleucine biosynthesis follow respectively. Conclusion: Artemisinin resulted in metabolic changes in biochemical pathways including galactose, sphingolipids and also valine, lucine, isoleucine that culminated in cessation of leishmania major’s (fredlin strain) activity. Spectra derived from H NMR showed significant difference (p