Limnophila aromatica is commonly used as a spice and a medicinal herb in Southeast Asia. In this study, water and various concentrations (50%, 75%, and 100%) of methanol, ethanol, and acetone in water were used as solvent in the extraction of L. aromatica. The antioxidant activity, total phenolic content, and total flavonoid content of the freeze-dried L. aromatica extracts were investigated using various in vitro assays. The extract obtained by 100% ethanol showed the highest total antioxidant activity, reducing power and DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl) radical scavenging activity. The same extract also exhibited the highest phenolic content (40.5 mg gallic acid equivalent/g of defatted L. aromatica) and the highest flavonoid content (31.11 mg quercetin equivalent/g of defatted L. aromatica). The highest extraction yield was obtained by using 50% aqueous acetone. These results indicate that L. aromatica can be used in dietary applications with a potential to reduce oxidative stress.

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Microemulsion (ME) is a micron-sized droplet that consists of oil and water, with addition of a surfactant and cosurfactant. Recently, ME is widely used in biomedical application for proper drug delivery in the human body. Castor oil as the oil phase, Tween 80 or Tween 20 as the surfactant, glycerol or ethanol as the cosurfactant, and DI water as the water phase were used for ME preparation in this study. The effect of the surfactant-to-cosurfactant ratio on the pseudoternary phase diagram was investigated. The as-synthesized ME with the composition of 5 wt.% castor oil, 85 wt.% surfactant mixture, and 10 wt.% water was characterized based on its particle size, polydispersity index, and zeta potential. From that composition, the largest ME was attained at an S mix 2 weight ratio of tween 80 to ethanol. Astaxanthin as lipophilic drug substance was used as the model drug for the ME encapsulation study. The thermal and storage analysis test of ME and astaxanthin-loaded ME demonstrated the stability of the assynthesized ME and its analogous drug-loaded form.