Dengue infections are still a worldwide burden, especially in Indonesia. There is no specific medication against the dengue virus. Recently, many types of research have been conducted to discover a new drug for dengue virus using natural resource extracts. Indonesia, as a tropical country, has a wide biodiversity. There are several medicinal plants in Indonesia that are believed to possess anti-dengue activity, such as Myristica fatua, Cymbopogon citratus, and Acorus calamus plants. We conducted an in vitro laboratory experiment of several extracts from Indonesian herbs combined with in silico analysis. The extracts were evaluated for safety and antiviral activity in Huh7it-1 cell lines, using a single dose of 20 µg/mL and dose-dependent (5, 10, 20, 40, 80 and 160 µg/mL) of plant extracts against dengue virus serotype 2 (DENV-2) NGC strain. The DMSO 0.1% was used as a negative control. The cytotoxic aspect was assessed by counting the cell viability, while the antiviral activity was calculated by counting the average inhibition. The selectivity index (SI) of plant extracts were performed from a ratio of CC50/EC50 value. In silico analysis was conducted to determine the free energy of binding between NS5 of dengue virus with bioactive compounds contained in Myristica fatua, Cymbopogon citratus and Acorus calamus extract plants. We determined that all extracts were not toxic against Huh7it-1 cell lines. The methanolic extracts of A. calamus, C. citratus, and M. fatua showed inhibition of DENV-2 at a dose of 20 µg/mL to 96.5%, 98.9%, and 122.7%, respectively. The dose-dependent effects showed that M. fatua has the best inhibition activity towards DENV-2. Molecular docking result showed that artesunic acid within M. fatua has the best free energy of binding (−7.2 kcal/mol), followed by homoegonol (−7.1 kcal/mol) which was slightly different from artesunic acid among others. The methanolic extracts of A. calamus, C. citratus, and M. fatua showed prospective anti-dengue activities both in vitro and in silico. Future research should be conducted to find the pure extracts of all useful herbs as a new candidate of antiviral drug.
The Zika virus disease, also known as Zika fever is an arboviral disease that became epidemic in the Pacific Islands and had spread to 18 territories of the Americas in 2016. Zika virus disease has been linked to several health problems such as microcephaly and the Guillain–Barré syndrome, but to date, there has been no vaccine available for Zika. Problems related to the development of a vaccine include the vaccination target, which covers pregnant women and children, and the antibody dependent enhancement (ADE), which can be caused by non-neutralizing antibodies. The peptide vaccine was chosen as a focus of this study as a safer platform to develop the Zika vaccine. In this study, a collection of Zika proteomes was used to find the best candidates for T- and B-cell epitopes using the immunoinformatics approach. The most promising T-cell epitopes were mapped using the selected human leukocyte antigen (HLA) alleles, and further molecular docking and dynamics studies showed a good peptide-HLA interaction for the best major histocompatibility complex-II (MHC-II) epitope. The most promising B-cell epitopes include four linear peptides predicted to be cross-reactive with T-cells, and conformational epitopes from two proteins accessible by antibodies in their native biological assembly. It is believed that the use of immunoinformatics methods is a promising strategy against the Zika viral infection in designing an efficacious multiepitope vaccine.
Malaria parasites have become the major health threat in increasing resistance toward common antimalarial drugs and become prime factors causing the strength of the disease. The objective of this study was investigating novel cinchona alkaloid derivatives (CADs) as potential antimalarial agents through molecular docking, pharmacopore modeling and biosynthesis design. Protein structure and cinchona alkaloid derivative structures were taken and performed for molecular interaction studies, pharmacophore modeling and mapping the binding modes of receptor-inhibitors which may increase the possibility of success rate in finding potential antimalarial candidates. Here, we report the greatest prospective inhibitor of Pf falcipain-2 is cinchonidine salicylate (-9.1 kcal/mol) through molecular docking approach. This compound exhibited distortion free of Lipinski`s rule. Hence, cinchonidine salicylate showed the most potential compound as antimalarial inhibitor over other cinchona alkaloid derivatives. Eventually, we construct biosynthesis pathways by using iron oxide nanoparticle (IONP) that could act as a coated nanoparticle to the natural bioactives to acquire optimum yield of the product by making coated nanoparticle with CADs which are powerful biosynthesis application in green environment of aqueous solution.
Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a chronic metabolic disorder characterized by hyperglycemia, which affects multiple tissues including kidneys. Soursop leaves (Annona muricata) are known to have antidiabetic potential, but their molecular and cellular effects are poorly characterized. We identified the bioactive compounds in soursop leaf ethanol extract (SLEE). The SLEE substances demonstrated the total alkaloid and total flavonoid contents. Twelve bioactive compounds profiles were identified in SLEE classified as alkaloid, flavonol glycoside, and monoterpenoid lactone derivatives. The SLEE treatments in mice were performed by dividing Swiss Webster mice into five groups, including negative and positive controls and three experimental groups provided with SLEE (doses 150, 300, and 600 mg/kg BW) for 14 days. The mice in the experimental groups were treated with alloxan to induce diabetes. The renal samples were stained for H&E for morphological changes. However, 600 mg/kg of SLEE showed a significant effect (p < 0.05) on the height of the Bowman’s space and prevented the tubularization of the left kidney’s glomerulus (p < 0.05). Altogether, we report no significant difference in the glomerular diameter, the thickness of the proximal convoluted tubules, the height of the Bowman’s space, and the glomerular tubularization after 14 days of treatment with SLEE.
P-glycoprotein (P-gp) resistance in cancer cells decreases the intracellular accumulation of various anticancer drugs. This multidrug resistance (MDR) protein can be modulated by number of non-cytotoxic drugs. We have screened 30 cinchona alkaloids derivatives as a potent P-gp inhibitor agent in silico. Hereby, we report the highest potential inhibitions of P-gp is Cinchonidine isobutanoate through molecular docking approach with affinity energy -8.6 kcal/mol and inhibition constant, Ki is 4.89 × 10 -7 M. Cinchonidine isobutanoate is also known has molecular weight below 500, Log P value 3.5, which is indicated violation free of Lipinski`s rule of five. Thus, Cinchonidine isobutanoate is the most potent compound as anticancer compare to other Cinchona alkaloids. Ultimately, we design Cinchonidine isobutanoate for further lead synthesis by using DBSA, act as a combined Brønsted acid-surfactantcatalyst (BASC) to obtain a high concentration of organic product by forming micellar aggregates which are very powerful catalytic application in a water environment.
Allicin compound (2-propene-1- sulphinothioat acid S-2-propenyl ester) is known to have potential as antiplasmodium in vitro. However, the inhibitory activity mechanism of Allicin to plasmodium is still unknown. In this research, we determined the inhibitory activity of Allicin in silico. Identification of physicochemical properties of Allicin compound and two Allicin derivatives, Alc1, Alc2 and Ac2Alc3 were also conducted.. Furthermore, analysis of drug-likeness and adsorption-distribution-metabolism-excretion (ADME) were carried out on the Allicin compound and its derivatives to find the potential of these compounds as drug candidates. In determining the specific interaction, we utilized molecular docking analysis between Allicin and its derivatives against a protein target Cysteine Protease (SP). Molecular docking results showed that Allicin derivative, Alc2 (S-prop-2-en-1-yl 3-methylbut-2-ene-1-sulfinothioate, C10H18OS2) has better potential as inhibitors than Allicin, based on the lower bond energies and the inhibition constants, thus Alc2 can be used as an antiplasmodium agent candidate.Keywords: Allicin, Allicin derivatives, drug likeness, ADME, molecular docking
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