Computational Drug Designing Group, Centre for Excellence in Computational Engineering and Networking, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Ettimadai, Coimbatore-641 105.
Apoptosis is a selective process for deletion of cells. It is generally involved in embryogenesis, tissue remodeling and also to maintain organ size and function. Sequential activation of caspases plays an important role in programmed cell death. In the caspase family, caspase-3 is an important effector protease that cleaves many downstream proteins. Damage in apoptotic pathways promotes uncontrolled growth of cancer cell. Analyses on clinical researches indicate that anticancer drugs activate cascade of apoptotic pathways either by positively or negatively regulating cell death induction. PAC-1 is such a compound, synthesized chemically that selectively induces apoptosis in cancer cells. This article reviews the effect of PAC-1 computationally, as a promoter for caspase-3. Docking of caspase-3 proteins with the specific ligand i.e., compound PAC-1, showed high interaction. The result shows that the PAC-1 facilitates the activation of caspase-3 and thus promotes the activation of apoptotic pathways and prevents the uncontrolled proliferation of cancer cells.
Apoptosis, caspases, tumour necrosis factor, death initiating, signaling complex, procaspase activating compound-1, docking, effector
