IN SILICO TARGET DECONVOLUTION OF CURCUMIN (DIFERULOYLMETHANE) AGAINST HUMAN JOHN CUNNINGHAM VIRUS

Abstract

Studies on antiviral properties of Curcumin bioconjugates such as di-O-tryptophanylphenylalanine curcumin and di-O-decanoyl curcumin have shown good results with EC₅₀ 0.011 mM and 0.029 mM against Vesicular stomatitis Indiana virus and Feline herpesvirus, respectively¹. In relation to its antiviral properties, Curcumin has been docked against the proteome of the dsDNA Human John Cunningham Virus (JCV) to identify if any of these proteins may act as targets for curcumin. The docking studies show low binding energies of curcumin with Agnoprotein of JCV with K_i value as low as 4.84 μM. The study has identified the same protein to be the susceptible target in JCV for binding of curcumin or its bioconjugates to combat the virus.