Drugability of secondary metabolites from selected spices of Zingiberaceae

The present study employs a cheminformatics approach to screen the diverse array of secondary metabolites from selected spices such as cardamom, ginger and turmeric belonging to the family Zingiberaceae. One thousand six hundred and sixty four (1664) chemical descriptors were calculated for 404 secondary metabolites. They were sieved and funneled through various filters, passed through all the in silico checks and finally selected only 13 compounds out of 404 compounds belonging to the family Zingiberaceae. Sieving 200 compounds from turmeric yielded only 11 compounds, whereas in case of cardamom and ginger it is only three out of 204 compounds. The major predicted activity of the drugable candidates belongs to bisabolane type sesquiterpinoids that are inhibitory to squalene-hopene cyclase (SHC) or oxidosqualene cyclase (OSC), an attractive target for anticholesteremic drugs. The present work ensures the success of discovery leads from spices to drug development.