Hypoglycemic and insulin mimetic impact of catechin isolated from Cassia fistula: a substantiate in silico approach through docking analysis

A study of ancient literature indicates that diabetes was fairly well known and well conceived as an entity in India. The nature has provided abundant plant wealth for all the living creatures, which possess medicinal virtues. Therefore, there is a necessity to explore their uses and to conduct pharmacognostic and pharmacological studies to ascertain their therapeutic properties. In fact, nowadays diabetes is a global problem. Hence, this study aims to open new avenues for the improvement of medicinal uses of catechin isolated from the methanol extract of Cassia fistula stem bark for the selected area of diabetes. Oral administration of catechin (20 mg/kg b.wt) for 60 days produce a better glucose tolerance pattern in Streptozotocin-induced diabetic male albino Wistar rats. Another important objective of the study is to bring the implication of computer-aided drug development. In biomedical arena, computer-aided or in silico design is being utilized to expedite and facilitate hit identification, hit-to-lead selection, optimize the absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion and toxicity profile, and avoid safety issues. Commonly used computational approaches include ligand-based drug design (pharmacophore, a 3-D spatial arrangement of chemical features essential for biological activity), structure-based drug design (drug target docking), and quantitative structure-activity and quantitative structure-property relationships. The 3D structure of the catechin was docked with the receptors (PPAR gamma and insulin receptor) by Discovery Studio 2.1 version (An Accelery's product). The results show that catechin possesses a potential agonist characteristic that is capable of activating Insulin receptor and Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma. These results confirm the hypoglycemic effect of catechin. We can conclude that catechin could be developed into potential oral hypoglycemic drug.