In Silico and In Vitro Potential Antifungal Insights of Insect-Derived Peptides in the Management of Candida sp. Infections

The worldwide increase in antifungal resistance, particularly in <i>Candida</i> sp., requires the exploration of novel therapeutic agents. Natural compounds have been a rich source of antimicrobial molecules, where peptides constitute the class of the most bioactive components. Therefore, this study looks into the target-specific binding efficacy of insect-derived antifungal peptides (<i>n</i> = 37) as possible alternatives to traditional antifungal treatments. Using computational methods, namely the HPEPDOCK and HDOCK platforms, molecular docking was performed to evaluate the interactions between selected key fungal targets, lanosterol 14-demethylase, or LDM (PDB ID: 5V5Z), secreted aspartic proteinase-5, or Sap-5 (PDB ID: 2QZX), N-myristoyl transferase, or NMT (PDB ID: 1NMT), and dihydrofolate reductase, or DHFR, of <i>C. albicans</i>. The three-dimensional peptide structure was modelled through the PEP-FOLD 3.5 tool. Further, we predicted the physicochemical properties of these peptides through the ProtParam and PEPTIDE 2.0 tools to assess their drug-likeness and potential for therapeutic applications. In silico results show that Blap-6 from <i>Blaps rhynchopeter</i> and Gomesin from <i>Acanthoscurria gomesiana</i> have the most antifungal potential against all four targeted proteins in <i>Candida</i> sp. Additionally, a molecular dynamics simulation study of LDM-Blap-6 was carried out at 100 nanoseconds. The overall predictions showed that both have strong binding abilities and are good candidates for drug development. In in vitro studies, Gomesin achieved complete biofilm eradication in three out of four <i>Candida</i> species, while Blap-6 showed moderate but consistent reduction across all species. <i>C. tropicalis</i> demonstrated relative resistance to complete eradication by both peptides. The present study provides evidence to support the antifungal activity of certain insect peptides, with potential to be used as alternative drugs or as a template for a new synthetic or modified peptide in pursuit of effective therapies against <i>Candida</i> spp.