Computational guided approach for drug repurposing against SARS-CoV-2
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Anand J
PROVIDER: S-EPMC7923689 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Mar
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic has generated a critical need for treatments to reduce morbidity and mortality associated with this disease. However, traditional drug development takes many years, which is not practical solution given the current pandemic. Therefore, a viable option is to repurpose existing drugs. The structural data of several proteins vital for the virus became available shortly after the start of the pandemic. In this review, we discuss the importance of these targets and their available potential inhibitors predicted by the computational approaches. Among the hits identified by computational approaches, 35 candidates were suggested for further evaluation, among which ten drugs are in clinical trials (Phase III and IV) for treating Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19).
| S-EPMC8830191 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Huge vaccination drives are underway around the world for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. However, the search for antiviral drugs is equally crucial. As new drug discovery is a time-consuming process, repurposing of existing drugs or developing drug candidates against SARS-CoV-2 will make the process faster. Considering this, 63 approved and developing antimalarial compounds were selected to screen against main protease (Mpro) and papain-like protease (PLpro) of SARS-CoV-2 using in silico methods to find out possible new drug candidate(s). Out of 63 compounds, epoxomicin showed the best binding affinity against the Mpro with CDocker energy of - 57.511 kcal/mol without any toxic effect. This compound was further taken for molecular dynamic simulation study, where the Mpro-epoxomicin complex was found to be stable with binding free energy - 79.315 kcal/mol. The possible inhibitory potential of the selected compound was determined by 3D-QSAR analysis and found to be 0.4447 µM against SARS-CoV-2 Mpro. Finally, the structure activity relationship of the compound was analyzed and two fragments responsible for overall good binding affinity of the compound at the active site of Mpro were identified. This study suggests a safe antimalarial drug, namely epoxomicin, as a probable inhibitor of SARS-CoV-2 Mpro which needs further validation by in vitro/in vivo studies before clinical use.Supplementary informationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11224-022-01916-0.
| S-EPMC9136827 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) caused a worldwide outbreak of coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19), which rapidly evolved as a global concern. The efforts of the scientific community are pointed towards the identification of promptly available therapeutic options. RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) is a promising target for developing small molecules to contrast SARS-CoV-2 replication. Modern computational tools can boost identification and repurposing of known drugs targeting RdRp. We here report the results regarding the screening of a database containing more than 8800 molecules, including approved, experimental, nutraceutical, illicit, withdrawn and investigational compounds. The molecules were docked against the cryo-electron microscopy structure of SARS-CoV-2 RdRp, optimized by means of molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The adopted three-stage ensemble docking study underline that compounds formerly developed as kinase inhibitors may interact with RdRp.Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma.
| S-EPMC7544925 | biostudies-literature
Project description:AimsThe recent outbreak of pandemic severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has led the world towards a global health emergency. Currently, no proper medicine or effective treatment strategies are available; therefore, repurposing of FDA approved drugs may play an important role in overcoming the situation.Materials and methodsThe SARS-CoV-2 genome encodes for 2-O-methyltransferase (2'OMTase), which plays a key role in methylation of viral RNA for evading host immune system. In the present study, the protein sequence of 2'OMTase of SARS-CoV-2 was analyzed, and its structure was modeled by a comparative modeling approach and validated. The library of 3000 drugs was screened against the active site of 2'OMTase followed by re-docking analysis. The apo and ligand-bound 2'OMTase were further validated and analyzed by using molecular dynamics simulation.Key findingsThe modeled structure displayed the conserved characteristic fold of class I MTase family. The quality assessment analysis by SAVES server reveals that the modeled structure follows protein folding rules and of excellent quality. The docking analysis displayed that the active site of 2'OMTase accommodates an array of drugs, which includes alkaloids, antivirals, cardiac glycosides, anticancer, steroids, and other drugs. The redocking and MD simulation analysis of the best 5 FDA approved drugs reveals that these drugs form a stable conformation with the 2'OMTase.SignificanceThe results suggested that these drugs may be used as potential inhibitors for 2'OMTase for combating the SARS-CoV-2 infection.
| S-EPMC7387922 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, large in silico screening studies and numerous in vitro studies have assessed the antiviral activity of various drugs on SARS-CoV-2. In the context of health emergency, drug repurposing represents the most relevant strategy because of the reduced time for approval by international medicines agencies, the low cost of development and the well-known toxicity profile of such drugs. Herein, we aim to review drugs with in vitro antiviral activity against SARS-CoV-2, combined with molecular docking data and results from preliminary clinical studies. Finally, when considering all these previous findings, as well as the possibility of oral administration, 11 molecules consisting of nelfinavir, favipiravir, azithromycin, clofoctol, clofazimine, ivermectin, nitazoxanide, amodiaquine, heparin, chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, show an interesting antiviral activity that could be exploited as possible drug candidates for COVID-19 treatment.
| S-EPMC8579950 | biostudies-literature
Project description:A novel severe acute respiratory syndrome human coronavirus (SARS HCoV) was identified from respiratory illness patients (named SARS-CoV-2 by ICTV) in December 2019 and has recently emerged as a serious threat to world public health. However, no approved drugs have been found to effectively inhibit the virus. Since it has been reported that HIV protease inhibitors can be used as anti-SARS drugs by targeting SARS-CoV-1 3CLpro, we chose six approved anti-HIV drugs and investigated their binding interactions with 3CLpro to evaluate their potential to become clinical drugs for the new coronavirus pneumonia (COVID-19) caused by SARS-CoV-2 infection. The molecular docking results indicate that the 3CLpro of SARS-CoV-2 has a higher binding affinity for all the studied inhibitors than does SARS-CoV-1. Two docking complexes (indinavir and darunavir) with high docking scores were further subjected to MM-PBSA binding free energy calculations to detail the molecular interactions between these two protease inhibitors and SARS HCoV 3CLpro. Our results show that, among the inhibitors tested, darunavir has the highest binding affinity with SARS-CoV-2 and SARS-CoV-1 3CLpro, indicating that it may have the potential to be used as an anti-COVID-19 clinical drug. The mechanism behind the increased binding affinity of HIV protease inhibitors toward SARS-CoV-2 3CLpro (as compared to SARS-CoV-1) was investigated by MD simulations. Our study provides insight into the possible role of structural flexibility during interactions between SARS HCoV 3CLpro and inhibitors and sheds light on structure-based design of anti-COVID-19 drugs targeting SARS-CoV-2 3CLpro.
| S-EPMC9052367 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Background and aimsSevere Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) induced Novel Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) has currently become pandemic worldwide. Though drugs like remdesivir, favipiravir, and dexamethasone found beneficial for COVID-19 management, they have limitations clinically, and vaccine development takes a long time. The researchers have reported key proteins which could act as druggable targets. Among them, the major protease Mpro is first published, plays a prominent role in viral replication and an attractive drug-target for drug discovery. Hence, to target Mpro and inhibit it, we accomplished the virtual screening of US-FDA approved drugs using well-known drug repurposing approach by computer-aided tools.MethodsThe protein Mpro, PDB-ID 6LU7 was imported to Maestro graphical user interphase of Schrödinger software. The US-FDA approved drug structures are imported from DrugBank and docked after preliminary protein and ligand preparation. The drugs are shortlisted based on the docking scores in the Standard Precision method (SP-docking) and then based on the type of molecular interactions they are studied for molecular dynamics simulations.ResultsThe docking and molecular interactions studies, five drugs emerged as potential hits by forming hydrophilic, hydrophobic, electrostatic interactions. The drugs such as arbutin, terbutaline, barnidipine, tipiracil and aprepitant identified as potential hits. Among the drugs, tipiracil and aprepitant interacted with the Mpro consistently, and they turned out to be most promising.ConclusionsThis study shows the possible exploration for drug repurposing using computer-aided docking tools and the potential roles of tipiracil and aprepitant, which can be explored further in the treatment of COVID-19.
| S-EPMC7498210 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Comparing SARS-CoV-2 infection-induced gene expression signatures to drug treatment-induced gene expression signatures is a promising bioinformatic tool to repurpose existing drugs against SARS-CoV-2. The general hypothesis of signature-based drug repurposing is that drugs with inverse similarity to a disease signature can reverse disease phenotype and thus be effective against it. However, in the case of viral infection diseases, like SARS-CoV-2, infected cells also activate adaptive, antiviral pathways, so that the relationship between effective drug and disease signature can be more ambiguous. To address this question, we analysed gene expression data from in vitro SARS-CoV-2 infected cell lines, and gene expression signatures of drugs showing anti-SARS-CoV-2 activity. Our extensive functional genomic analysis showed that both infection and treatment with in vitro effective drugs leads to activation of antiviral pathways like NFkB and JAK-STAT. Based on the similarity-and not inverse similarity-between drug and infection-induced gene expression signatures, we were able to predict the in vitro antiviral activity of drugs. We also identified SREBF1/2, key regulators of lipid metabolising enzymes, as the most activated transcription factors by several in vitro effective antiviral drugs. Using a fluorescently labeled cholesterol sensor, we showed that these drugs decrease the cholesterol levels of plasma-membrane. Supplementing drug-treated cells with cholesterol reversed the in vitro antiviral effect, suggesting the depleting plasma-membrane cholesterol plays a key role in virus inhibitory mechanism. Our results can help to more effectively repurpose approved drugs against SARS-CoV-2, and also highlights key mechanisms behind their antiviral effect.
| S-EPMC9022874 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The high incidences of COVID-19 cases are believed to be associated with high transmissibility rates, which emphasizes the need for the discovery of evidence-based antiviral therapies for curing the disease. The rationale of repurposing existing classes of antiviral small molecule therapeutics against SARS-CoV-2 infection has been expected to accelerate the tedious and expensive drug development process. While Remdesivir has been recently approved to be the first treatment option for specific groups of COVID-19 patients, combinatory therapy with potential antiviral drugs may be necessary to enhance the efficacy in different populations. Hence, a comprehensive list of investigational antimicrobial drug compounds such as Favipiravir, Fidaxomicin, Galidesivir, GC376, Ribavirin, Rifabutin, and Umifenovir were computationally evaluated in this study. We performed in silico docking and molecular dynamics simulation on the selected small molecules against RNA-dependent RNA polymerase, which is one of the key target proteins of SARS-CoV-2, using AutoDock and GROMACS. Interestingly, our results revealed that the macrocyclic antibiotic, Fidaxomicin, possesses the highest binding affinity with the lowest energy value of -8.97 kcal/mol binding to the same active sites of RdRp. GC376, Rifabutin, Umifenovir and Remdesivir were identified as the next best compounds. Therefore, the above-mentioned compounds could be considered good leads for further preclinical and clinical experimentations as potentially efficient antiviral inhibitors for combination therapies against SARS-CoV-2.
| S-EPMC9514006 | biostudies-literature
Project description:This article highlights recent pioneering work by Günther et al. towards the discovery of potential repurposed antiviral compounds (peptidomimetic and non-peptidic) against the SARS-CoV-2 main protease (Mpro ). The antiviral activity of the most potent drugs is discussed along with their binding mode to Mpro as observed through X-ray crystallographic screening.
| S-EPMC8652770 | biostudies-literature