Drug Repurposing Against SARS-CoV-2: Targeting Nsp16-Nsp10 Interaction

Abstract

Drug repurposing studies have played a crucial role in fighting the Covid-19 pandemic.Discovering a new drug molecule for disease takes a very long time. However, repurposing a drugmolecule developed for another disease can accelerate new treatments for a disease. Thus, several drugrepurposing studies were carried out targeting essential proteins for SARS-CoV-2. Nsp16-Nsp10 interactionwas targeted in this work since this interaction is needed for SARS-CoV-2 to evade the human immunesystem. Therefore, docking calculations of approved 2126 drug molecules obtained from the Drugbankdatabase were performed using the AutoDock Vina program. These docking calculations, drugs LedipasvirElbasvir, Venetoclax, Digitoxin, Irinotecan, Dexamethasone, Acetyldigitoxin, Dactinomycin, Lumacaftor,and Simeprevir, have the highest docking scores. Significant interactions for these drug molecules werepresented.