An Insight into Strain-Specificity of Streptomyces chrestomyceticus ADP4 and Identification of a Novel Peptide with Potential Antiviral Activities Against Significant Human Viruses, Including SARS-CoV2, HCV, and HIV

This study aimed to unravel the genomic uniqueness of Streptomyces chrestomyceticus ADP4 using whole-genome sequence analysis, with a focus on identifying strain-specific genes/proteins associated with a novel therapeutic source. The genome of the strain ADP4 was sequenced and assembled to a total size of 9.64 MB. A total of 8378 coding regions were identified. Strain ADP4 was found to be clustered into a clade of the species S. chrestomyceticus. Fifty-one biosynthetic gene clusters were predicted in the genome of the strain ADP4, and three of them were common to all the strains of S. chrestomyceticus. A comparative metabolic profile of S. chrestomyceticus revealed a unique metabolic protein, supporting strain-level variations. Comparative genome analysis led to the identification of the genomic sequences that were specific to the strain ADP4. These strain-specific unique sequences of ADP4 were identified across the available data, underscoring their distinct genetic identity. Among these eight functionally uncharacterized hypothetical proteins (HPs), only two could be assigned with functional attributes, wherein one of them, HP2, was ascertained to be a peptide with possible antiviral activity, underscoring its potential as a novel drug candidate for aantiviraltherapy. The structural validation and peptide–protein molecular docking have evidently demonstrated anantiviralctivity of HP2 against significant human viral pathogens, for example, HIV, SARS-CoV2, HCV, ZIKV, JEV, and DENV.