PLoS neg trop dis: a new drug for the treatment of Nipah virus

December 17, 2019 / Biovalley BIOON / -- Nipah virus is a virus with a high mortality rate transmitted to humans from bats and pigs, and there is no licensed drug for it Now, using information about the structure of the Nipah virus, researchers have identified 150 possible virus inhibitors The results were published in the journal PLoS neglected tropical diseases Nipah virus infection has killed 72-86% of those infected in Bangladesh and India Although the disease was first discovered in 1998, there is no approved drug or vaccine for the disease Although the total number of deaths associated with each outbreak never exceeded 105, the disease poses a fatal threat and has the potential to become a pandemic In the new study, MADHUSUDHAN and his colleagues from the China India Institute of science, education and research first identified a three-dimensional model of nine Nipah virus proteins They then used these models to design inhibitory molecules to block the activity of proteins Finally, the team evaluated the effectiveness of potential inhibitors against 15 different virus strains (3 Bengali, 7 Malaysian and 5 Indian) (image source: www Pixabay Com) the researchers calculated four putative peptide inhibitors and 146 small molecule inhibitors against Nipah virus protein Based on their binding strength, stability and effectiveness against a variety of Nipah viruses, 13 of their proposed inhibitors were selected as the most promising "We conclude that the proposed inhibitors are highly likely to be effective against all Nipah and other related zoonotic viruses that pose a serious epidemic threat," the researchers said "Computational methods can help identify and design inhibitors that can be tested and even deployed quickly." Sources of information: new drug targets to treat Nipah virus original sources: neeladri Sen, tejashree rajaram kanikar, Ankit animesh Roy, neelish Soni, kaustubh amritkar, shreyas supekar, sanjana Nair, Gulzar Singh, M S MADHUSUDHAN Forecasting and designing therapeutics against the Nipah virus; 13 (12): e0007419 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pntd.0007419