Curcumin Inhibits Zika Virus NS3 Helicase Activity

Abstract

In the last decades, many efforts have been put forward in search of inhibitors/drugs specific to ZIKV-infected patients. These inhibitors include approved drugs, natural products, nucleosides, small molecules, and many others to inhibit Zika virus replication in cell and mouse models. In this regard, natural product curcumin has been widely explored in various disease conditions and found to have inhibition potential against ZIKV replication as well. Further, we investigated its inhibitory ability against the ZIKV NS3 helicase. We found that the curcumin interacts with the NS3 helicase domain by forming stable contacts at NTPase and RNA binding sites during molecular dynamic simulation. Furthermore, curcumin inhibits NTPase activity of NS3 helicase with an IC50 of 64.42 M. Altogether, the mechanistic insight into the action of curcumin will enlighten further drug discovery research in finding novel molecules.