Evaluation of Interactions of Triterpenes in M. charantia with Proteins Involved in Vascularization in In Silico

Abstract

Angiogenesis is an important process that plays an active role in tumorigenesis. VEGFRs, a member of the tyrosine kinase receptor family involved in this process, is known as the receptor for VEGF ligands in tumor cells. c-Src is an adapter protein located downstream of VEGFRs and plays a role in angiogenic signaling. SPARC protein has recently been shown to play a role in metastasis in various types of cancer. In this study, inhibition of angiogenesis via extracellular matrix and VEGF/VEGFRs is aimed. Momordica charantia; is a valuable plant used quite often in traditional medicine. Triterpenes from various regions of plant appear to be promising in in vitro cancer-related studies. In our study; literature was searched to identify possible triterpenes in this plant; triterpenes in fruit and seed were selected. The 2D and 3D structure files of these triterpenes were obtained from PubChem. The structure files of the ligands were prepared with various programs and converted to the appropriate file format. X-ray diffraction structures of proteins were obtained from RCSB PDB. These structure files were made suitable for molecular docking studies. Docking and scoring were performed with the Vina program to select the appropriate poses. According to the in silico analysis; It has been found that various triterpenes that can be obtained from M. charantia plant may inhibit VEGFRs, SPARC, and c-Src proteins. These results show that these triterpenes are promising in terms of new natural therapeutic routes and drug candidates for aggressive cancer therapy.