Targeting <i>Mycobacterium tuberculosis</i>: identification of potential phytochemicals from traditional plants against glucosyl-3-phosphoglycerate phosphatase (GpgP)

Tuberculosis (TB) is a transmissible disease that causes severe infections in adults as well as in infants, as they have immature immune systems. Lungs are the main site for pulmonary TB infection, although TB can affect other parts like lymph nodes, bone, joints, etc., which is known as extrapulmonary TB. <i>M. tuberculosis</i> is becoming one of the world’s most severe pathogens due to growing multidrug resistance (MDR) and extensively drug resistance (XDR), rendering treatment medications useless. GpgP was chosen as the promising drug target protein in this study because it is primarily involved in the catalysis of the second step in the production of Methylglucose lipopolysaccharides (MGLPs), which regulate the synthesis of mycolic acids, which are an essential component for building the mycobacterial cell envelope. The cell envelope of <i>M. tuberculosis</i> is unique and is responsible for the bacteria’s flexibility and pathogenicity. An <i>in-house</i> library of phytochemicals was utilized for screening in AutoDock Vina, and then the ligands were docked using AutoDock with the drug target protein for further validation. Then, four ligands were filtered out using SwissADME that were further studied by performing molecular dynamic simulations. After a thorough analysis, CID_446611 and CID_5282146 ligands were identified as potential inhibitors of GpgP.