Vol 12, Issue 7, 2019 Online - 2455-3891 Print - 0974-2441 TOTAL FLAVONOID CONTENT ANALYSIS FOUR ILER ACCESSIONS (COLEUS ATROPURPUREUS [L] BENTH) ON LOWLAND KARANGANYAR, CENTRAL JAVA, INDONESIA FITRIA ROVIQOWATI 1 , YULI WIDIYASTUTI 2 , SAMANHUDI 3 , AHMAD YUNUS 3 * 1 Department of Agronomy, Graduate School of Sebelas Maret University, Surakarta, Indonesia. 2 Research and Development Center for Medicinal Plant and Traditional Drug, Tawangmangu, Karanganyar, Central Java, Indonesia. 3 Department of Agrotechnology, Faculty of Agriculture, Sebelas Maret University, Surakarta, Indonesia. Email: yunus.uns7@yahoo.com Received: 11 February 2019, Revised and Accepted: 20 May 2019 ABSTRACT Objective: Iler is an ornamental plant that can be used as a medicinal plant. An effort to increase the flavonoids content was done by planting Iler in the lowlands with the hope that it can increase the secondary metabolites contained to meet the needs of flavonoids obtained from nature. Methods: This research was conducted in Tegal Gedhe Village, Karanganyar Regency with an altitude of 182 m above sea level with Brown Mediterranean soil types. The study used a completely randomized block design. The treatment used consists of one factor which was four accessions of iler plants. Analysis of iler extract was done using ethanol, while analysis of thin layer chromatography (TLC) used the n-hexane:ethyl acetate (6:4) and analysis of total flavonoid were used the AlCl 3 method using a spectrophotometer. Results: The total extract content of iler plant in this study was not significantly different, which was accession 1 by 4.009% (±0.36), accession 2 by 5.677% (±0.25), accession 3 by 6.892% (±0.83), and accession 4 by 5.913% (±0.57). TLC analysis shows that accession 1 and accession 2 had 8 spots, while accession 3 and accession 4 formed 9 spots. The highest total flavonoid content was found in accession 2 (5.848% [±0.25]). Conclusion: Accession 2 has a better morphology such as wider leaves characterized by higher source of flavonoids and longer vegetative life than the other three accessions. Keywords: Flavonoid, Coleus atropurpureus, Iler accession, Medicinal plant, Lowland. INTRODUCTION Iler (Coleus atropurpureus) is a plant that is easily propagated and commonly grows tropical area. The main utilization of iler plants is a medicinal material which contains flavonoids that can be used as an alternative in the development of herbal plants in the world. Iler plants produce secondary metabolites in the form of steroids. In one research [1], pure isolates of steroids were obtained in the form of crystal needles with clear white color. The results of tests carried out using Liebermann–Burchard reagent resulted in the appearance of a green ring shape, indicating that secondary metabolites were found to be positive for steroids. The research of Lisdawati et al. [2] stated that iler plants contained a class of chemical compounds in the form of terpenoids, tannins, catechin tannins, and flavonoids. The content of flavonoids has been proven to be used as antimalaria. Flavonoids in leaves act as a protection substance against ultraviolet (UV)-B rays, microbial infections, pigmentation, and contain antioxidants which is useful as drugs [3]. Furthermore, flavonoids can be used as prevention for cancer and coronary heart disease [4]. Another research Yohanes et al. [5] stated that the main content of secondary metabolites present in beluntas (Pluchea indica L.) is flavonoids. The extract obtained was isolated using thin-layer chromatography, the obtained flavonoid compounds were flavonol compounds. There are six main sub-classes of flavonoids, namely flavones (apigenin and luteolin), flavanone (naringenin and hesperidin), flavonol (quercetin and myricetin), catechins or flavanols (epicatechin and gallocatechin), isoflavones (genistein and daidzein), and anthocyanidin (cyanidin and pelargonidin). Flavonoids in plants are mostly in the form of sugar (glycosides), although they are sometimes found in the form of aglycones [6]. Flavonoids are able to counteract free radicals in Melissa officinalis extract [7]. This compound has a higher flavonoid content compared to four other tested plants. In Euphorbia neriifolia plants, there are a lot of flavonoid compounds which are characterized by chemical bonds that are formed 2-(3,4-dihidroxy-5-methoxy-phenyl)-3,5-dihydroxy-6,7- dimethoxychromen-4,5-one. Flavonoids can be used as antioxidants to kill cancer cells and tumors [8]. The high flavonoids utilities in health requires more studies to be carried out to obtain the better sources of flavonoids from nature, as conducting research this research on iler plants which four iler accessions, to understand the accession that produces highest flavonoids that can be obtained as a medicine. This study aims to determine the flavonoid content of four accessions of iler plants grown in the lowlands. MATERIALS AND METHODS Plant material was obtained from four accessions of iler plants with violet leaf color, i.e. accession 1 (deep purple), accession 2 (greenish purple), accession 3 (green), and accession 4 (reddish purple). Leaves used for analysis were taken from leaf pairs to 1–10 each plant sample. In this study, all accessions used the same harvest criteria, which was 75% of the plant population which had flowered in each trial plot. © 2019 The Authors. Published by Innovare Academic Sciences Pvt Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons. org/licenses/by/4. 0/) DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.22159/ajpcr.2019.v12i7.32513 Research Article