Computational identification and screening of natural compounds as drug targets against the fish pathogen, Pseudomonas fluorescens

Abstract

Pseudomonas fluorescens is an important fish pathogen responsible for septicemia and ulcers in many fish species. Control of this pathogen in aquaculture systems is necessary to prevent the outbreak of disease in farmed fish. In this study, the complete proteomic information of different strains of P. fluorescens available in public domains was used for in silico subtractive analysis against zebrafish proteome to identify putative drug targets in P. fluorescens. The proteome set of P. fluorescens consisted of 32,664 proteins of which 7,794 were identified as non-paralogous protein sequences. A total of 163 essential proteins were identified in P. fluorescens with the majority of the proteins being involved in glycan biosynthesis and genetic information processing pathway. In the present study, two outer membrane proteins (OMPs), a surface antigen-D15 and a fimbrial biogenesis outer membrane usher protein, were identified as putative drug targets. A total of 2885 natural compounds available in ZINC database were virtually screened to identify their efficacy as putative drugs against the identified targets. Five natural compounds were identified, which bind to the putative drug targets and interfere with their functions. These compounds may be potentially useful as prophylactic and chemotherapeutic agents against P. fluorescence in aquaculture systems.