Identification of potential JNK3 inhibitors through virtual screening, molecular docking and molecular dynamics simulation as therapeutics for Alzheimer's disease

© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG..

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a complex neurological disorder and no effective drug is available for its treatment. Numerous pathological conditions are believed to be responsible for the initiation and development of AD including c-Jun N-terminal kinases (JNKs). The JNKs are one of the enzymes from the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) family that controls the phosphorylation of various transcription factors on serine and threonine residues, and hold significant responsibilities in tasks like gene expression, cell proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis. Since, JNK3 is primarily expressed in the brain hence its increased levels in the brain are associated with the AD pathology promoting neurofibrillary tangles, senile plaques, neuroinflammation, and nerve cell apoptosis. The current research work is focused on the development of novel JNK inhibitors as therapeutics for AD employing a structure-based virtual screening (SBVS) approach. The ZINC database (14634052 compounds) was investigated after employing pan assay interference (PAINs), drug-likeness, and diversity picking filter to distinguish molecules interacting with JNK3 by following three docking precision criteria: High Throughput Virtual Screening (HTVS), Standard Precision (SP), and Extra Precision (XP) & MMGBSA. Five lead molecules showed a better docking score in the range of -13.091 to -14.051 kcal/mol better than the reference compound (- 11.828 kcal/mol). The lead compounds displayed acceptable pharmacokinetic properties and were subjected to molecular dynamic simulations of 100 ns and binding free energy calculations. All the lead molecules showed stable RMSD and hydrogen bond interactions throughout the trajectory. The ∆GMM/PBSA_total score for the lead compounds ZINC220382956, ZINC147071339, ZINC207081127, ZINC205151456, ZINC1228819126, and CC-930 was calculated and found to be - 31.39, - 42.8, - 37.04, - 39.01, - 36.5, - 34.16 kcal/mol, respectively. Thus, it was concluded that the lead molecules identified in these studies have the potential to be explored as potent JNK3 inhibitors.

Medienart:

E-Artikel

Erscheinungsjahr:

2024

Erschienen:

2024

Enthalten in:

Zur Gesamtaufnahme - year:2024

Enthalten in:

Molecular diversity - (2024) vom: 04. Apr.

Sprache:

Englisch

Beteiligte Personen:

Devi, Bharti [VerfasserIn]
Jangid, Kailash [VerfasserIn]
Kumar, Naveen [VerfasserIn]
Kumar, Vinay [VerfasserIn]
Kumar, Vinod [VerfasserIn]

Links:

Volltext

Themen:

Alzheimer’s disease
Free Energy Landscape
HTVS
JNK3 inhibitors
Journal Article
MMGB/PBSA
Molecular dynamics simulation
Neurological disorders

Anmerkungen:

Date Revised 04.04.2024

published: Print-Electronic

Citation Status Publisher

doi:

10.1007/s11030-024-10820-0

funding:

Förderinstitution / Projekttitel:

PPN (Katalog-ID):

NLM37062856X