Exploring Juniperus phoenicea L extract through phytochemical analysis, anti-lipase effects, and comprehensive molecular studies

Lipase inhibitors are used in the treatment of candidiasis, obesity, and acne problems. Therefore, the investigation of new natural lipase inhibitors has generated great interest. Juniperus phoenicea is a small Mediterranean tree considered an important medicinal plant. Through this work, we investigated the composition and inhibition effect of J. phoenicea extract on Candida rugosa and human lipases; and we analyzed the interactions between detected compounds and lipases using molecular docking, ADME-T, and dynamic studies. We extracted the secondary metabolites from the plant aerial parts and tested their activities against lipase. We examined major components of J. phoenicea, using Autodock vina for molecular docking, Desmond from Schrodinger suite 2021–1 for dynamics, and evaluating its drug-likeness and toxicity properties using ADMET webserver. We found that the IC₅₀ values of ethyl acetate and methanol extracts are 1.33±0.10 and 1.731 mg/mL. Using HPLC quantitative analysis we identified in ethyl acetate extract the following phenolic compounds gallic acid, rutin, apigenin-7-O-glucoside, cinnamic acid, and quercetin. The complex apigenin-7-O-glucoside-lipase is stabilized by four hydrogen bonds and hydrophobic interactions, and the binding energy equals -10 Kcal/mol, which is better than the interactions saved for orlistat. Dynamic Simulation demonstrated better stability in the ligand-protein complex apigenin-7-O-glucoside-1lpb within 100 ns than the orlistat-1lpb complex. This study is described in this work for the first time. The results indicated that apigenin-7-O-glucoside from J. phoenicea L could be a good choice to develop a new drug candidate against candidiasis, obesity, and other lipase-related diseases.