Identification of natural inhibitors against Mpro of SARS-CoV-2 by molecular docking, molecular dynamics simulation, and MM/PBSA methods

The recent outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 disease, also known as COVID-19, has emerged as a pandemic. The unavailability of specific therapeutic drugs and vaccines urgently demands sincere efforts for drug discovery against COVID-19. The main protease (Mpro) of SARS-CoV-2 is a critical drug target as it plays an essential role in virus replication. Therefore for the identification of potential inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 Mpro, we applied a structure-based virtual screening approach followed by molecular dynamics (MD) study. A library of 686 phytochemicals was subjected to virtual screening which resulted in 28 phytochemicals based on binding energy. These phytochemicals were further subjected to drug-likeness and toxicity analysis, which resulted in seven drug-like hits. Out of seven, five phytochemicals viz., Mpro-Dehydrtectol (-10.3 kcal/mol), Epsilon-viniferin (-8.6 kcal/mol), Peimisine (-8.6 kcal/mol), Gmelanone (-8.4 kcal/mol), and Isocolumbin (-8.4 kcal/mol) were non-toxic. Consequently, these phytochemicals are subjected to MD, post MD analysis, and MM/PBSA calculations. The results of 100 ns MD simulation, RMSF, SASA, Rg, and MM/PBSA show that Epsilon-viniferin (-29.240 kJ/mol), Mpro-Peimisine (-43.031 kJ/mol) and Gmelanone (-13.093 kJ/mol) form a stable complex with Mpro and could be used as potential inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 Mpro. However, further investigation of these inhibitors against Mpro receptor of COVID-19 is needed to validate their candidacy for clinical trials. Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma

Automated summary

The recent outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the urgent need for drug discovery against SARS-CoV-2. In this study, a structure-based virtual screening approach and molecular dynamics simulation were used to identify potential inhibitors of the main protease (Mpro) of SARS-CoV-2. Several phytochemicals were identified as potential drug candidates, and further analysis showed that three compounds form stable complexes with Mpro and could be used as potential inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 Mpro. Further investigation is needed to validate their effectiveness in clinical trials.