Description:
Aim and Scope: Prostate cancer will occur when immortal cells develop in the
prostate gland. It was frequently diagnosed in men and becomes the fourth most
common cancer in the world in 2014. In Indonesia, it has high prevalence of
about 16 cases in 100,000 of men. Furthermore, Indonesia has an endemic plant
called Pasak Bumi (Eurycoma longifolia Jack) which is well-known as traditional
medicine and cancer therapy. The root extract of Pasak Bumi consists of
eurycomanone, quassinoid, and canthin. Therefore, this study aimed to predict
the potency of E. longifolia active compounds as prostate cancer therapy.
Material and Methods: There are four essential protein targets in prostate
cancer such as Bcl-2, RAS, MAPK, and CASP. The three-dimensional structure of
active compounds was retrieved from PubChem, and protein target was
downloaded from Protein Data Bank. The interactions were calculated using
Pyrx.0.8. Thus, the molecular interaction was analyzed using LigPlus. Moreover,
the biological activity of the active compound was analyzed using PASS server.
Results and Discussion: Results showed that each active compound is strongly
bind to RAS and only RAS -quassinoid complex which has the lowest binding
affinity score about −9.3 Kcal/mol. Based on the structure-activity relationship
analysis, only eurycomanone and quassinoid which potentially involved in the
anticancer mechanism as antineoplastic and apoptosis agonist. It means these
compounds are blocking the active site of RAS protein to inhibit the cell
proliferation. Conclusion: It can be concluded that all active compounds have the
lowest binding affinity to RAS. Moreover, quassinoid is the most active
compounds which have the influence to RAS. It shows that quassinoid potentially
as a therapeutic agent.
KEY WORDS: Anticancer, Apoptosis, Canthin, Eurycomanone, Herbal compound, Inhibitor, Prostate cancer, Quassinoid