Denis Qoray successfully defended his Master thesis: “Screening of new potential inhibitors against chitin synthases using in silico, in vitro, and in vivo approaches”

Today, Denis Qoray successfully defended his Master thesis which he performed in the framework of the Indo-German BioeconomyInternational project Bio-Fun, which is led by our bioinformatician post-doctoral researcher Dr. Ratna Singh and which is financially supported by BMBF. In this project Ratna and her group are aiming to develop novel inhibitors of chitin and chitosan biosynthesis to be used as antifungal – and possibly anti-insect – plant protectants and medical or veterinary drugs. Denis performed an in depth structural analysis of a chitin synthase, using state-of-the-art in silico methods of molecular docking and molecular dynamics simulations to understand the interaction between this enzyme and known chitin synthase inhibitors. He then tested in vitro a series of molecules which Ratna had identified using sophisticated in silico approachesas potential inhibitor candidates. Based on these measurements and in silico comparisons with the known inhibitors, Denis proposed a derivative of one of these novel compounds which should possess even stronger inhibitory activities. This derivative is currently being synthesised by the Indian collaborators in our project, Prof. Rengarajan Balamurugan and Prof. Ramu SridharPerali, both from the Institute of Chemistry at University of Hyderabad. Given the increasing incidences of fungal diseases in human patients with compromised immune systems and the fact, that more and more fungal pathogens – of humans, animals, and plants – have become resistant to the few available antimycotic drugs and to agricultural fungicides, the development of novel active ingredients is important and urgent. We do hope and trust that Denis’ thesis, and Ratna’s project, will contribute to achieving this goal.