Garlic as an effective antifungal inhibitor: A combination of reverse docking, molecular dynamics simulation, ADMET screening, DFT, and retrosynthesis studies

Abstract

Fungal infections profoundly affect human health, causing a substantial number of infections and millions of fatalities annually on a global scale. The identification of new drugs targeting this infection is a challenge that is not yet complete. Natural products, including medicinal and aromatic plants, substances that act as sources of beneficial chemical compounds for the development of efficient therapies, are among the medicines that can be used to combat this type of infection. In this study, seven bioactive molecules derived from garlic plant as potential antifungal inhibitors were investigated using computational methods. Alliin and S-allyl-cysteine, bioactive molecules generated from garlic, showed good stability at the active site of the studied receptor (PDB code: 5TZ1). They provided binding energies of -4.80 and -4.90 Kcal/mol, and inhibition constant (Ki) values of 303.78 and 253.68 µM, respectively. Similarly, alliin and S-allyl-cysteine were stabilized in the active site of the target receptor by conventional hydrogen bonds with residues Ser507 (2.47 Å), Ser378 (3.01 Å), Met508 (2.62 Å, 3.46 Å), and His377 (3.00 Å), Ser378 (3.09 Å), Met508 (2.01 Å), Ser507 (2.26 Å), respectively. These results were confirmed by molecular dynamic simulation. The selected molecules comply with the most important drug rules such as Lipinski, Veber and Egan, have good ADME properties and are not toxic; therefore, these bioactive molecules have good pharmacokinetic properties and bioavailability. The retrosynthesis method has created a pathway for the synthesis of these candidate inhibitors. As a result, the outcomes of this study strongly suggest that Alliin, S-allyl-cysteine, are potential antifungal inhibitors in the future.