In silico comparisons between natural inhibitors of ABCB1/P-glycoprotein to overcome doxorubicin-resistance in the NCI/ADR-RES cell line.

To investigate compound-protein binding mode and molecular dynamic simulation of P-glycoprotein (P-gp), in silico studies were performed to compare 12 naturally occurring compounds using two softwares. The net results showed that piperine (PIP) had the best binding affinity. In vitro studies on doxorubicin (DOX)-resistant NCI/ADR-RES cells, known to express P-gp, showed that, dose-dependently, PIP significantly increased intracellular accumulation of rhodamine-123 and had cytotoxic effects accessed by MTT assay. In addition, PIP at 25 and 50μM significantly potentiated DOX-induced cytotoxicity on the same cell line. P-gp ATPase assay showed that both DOX and PIP had dose-dependent inhibition of orthovandate-sensitive ATPase activity, indicating they are both P-gp inhibitors, with IC of 84±1 and 37±2μM, respectively. PIP did not show any activation of ATPase activity, while DOX did, indicating that P-gp does not accept PIP as a substrate. Using DOX at concentration 33.33μM together with PIP (100μM), DOX-mediated P-gp ATPase activity was decreased to levels 4-folds lower than DOX alone. In conclusion, both in silico and in vitro studies confirm that PIP is an inhibitor of P-gp mediated DOX efflux, suggesting PIP as a promising adjuvant to DOX cancer chemotherapy.