Current projects and researche areas:

• Finding and developing of novel safe natural/synthetic compounds as Hsp90 and tyrosinase inhibitors for therapeutic and industrial purposes

Part 1: Hsp90 inhibition

• Cancer is considered as one of the main challenges for human health. One way to deal with most cancers is inhibition of Hsp90 molecular chaperone which is overexpressed in most cancerous cells. This chaperon is responsible for the folding and stability of many proteins called "client proteins". Many of these clients are involved in carcinogenic signaling pathways. Inhibition of Hsp90 has so become one of the most important therapeutic targets for cancer treatment and finding new and safe Hsp90 inhibitors is accounted as a promising therapeutic strategy for development of new and effective anti-cancer agents. We theoretically and experimentally evaluate the Hsp90 inhibitory potency of natural or novel synthetic compounds regarding to introduction new compounds as anticancer candidate drugs.

Part 2: Tyrosinase inhibition

• Tyrosinase is a copper-containing enzyme and catalyzes rate limiting steps in melanin biosynthesis. Overproduction and deposition of this pigment causes different problems in various industries including food, agriculture, and medicine. It is responsible for browning of fruits and vegetables which finally results in reducing their commercial value and quality. In human, overexpression and activation of tyrosinase result in different pathologies and dysfunctions such as age spots, nevus, chloasma, solar lentigo, melanoma, freckles, and post-inflammatory states. It has been also documented that disorders in the melanin biosynthesis is linked to the neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer, Parkinson, and Huntington. Although different inhibitors have been investigated so far, only few of them are efficient for industrial applications and others have different limitations or side effects which restrict their usage. Thus discovering new safe tyrosinase inhibitors has attracted great research interest due to their broad applications. We investigate theoretically and experimentally the tyrosinase inhibitory potencies of novel synthetic/natural compounds.