Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a respiratory disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), is a global health concern, as the World Health Organization declared this outbreak to be a global pandemic in March 2020. The need for an effective treatment is urgent because the development of an effective vaccine may take years given the complexity of the virus and its rapid mutation. One promising treatment target for COVID-19 is SARS-CoV-2 main protease. Thus, this study was aimed to examine whether Sulawesi propolis compounds produced by
Tetragonula sapiens
inhibit the enzymatic activity of SARS-CoV-2 main protease. In this study, molecular docking was performed to analyze the interaction profiles of propolis compounds with SARS-CoV-2 main protease. The results illustrated that two compounds, namely glyasperin A and broussoflavonol F, are potential drug candidates for COVID-19 based on their binding affinity of −7.8 kcal/mol and their ability to interact with His
41
and Cys
145
as catalytic sites. Both compounds also displayed favorable interaction profiles with SARS-CoV-2 main protease with binding similarities compared to inhibitor 13b as positive control 63% and 75% respectively.
Objective: The present study aimed to evaluate those 3 compounds among 122 Thai natural products by using a molecular docking approach to inhibit Main Protease (Mpro) of SARS-CoV-2 (PDB code: 6Y2F), Angiotensin Converting Enzyme (ACE)-2 (PDB code: 1R4L), and PAK-1 kinase (PDB code: 5DEW).
Methods: The evaluation was performed on the docking scores calculated using AutoDock Vina as a docking engine and interaction profile analysis through 2-dimensional visualization using LigPlot+. The determination of the docking score was done by selecting the conformation of the ligand that has the lowest binding free energy (best pose).
Result: The results of this study indicate that overall, Panduratin A has the best affinity in inhibiting the main protease of SARS-CoV-2, ACE-2, and PAK-1 compared to other compounds.
Conclusion: The three thai medicinal plants compound has the potential to be developed as specific therapeutic agents against COVID-19.
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