LACCASE MEDIATED BIOREMEDIATION OF PHARMACEUTICAL POLLUTANTS: MOLECULAR DOCKING AND SYNTHETIC PATHWAY PREDICTION OF CARBAMAZEPINE

Abstract

Environmentally Persistent Pharmaceutical Pollutants (EPPPs) along with Personal Care Products (PPCs) poses great challenges to human health and aquatic ecosystem. Numerous reports have indicated their presence in the river, surface water, ground water and wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) of India. The tendency of pharmaceutical products to remain active in the waterbodies even in the low concentrations, make them very dangerous for the human health and the ecosystem. Conventional WWTPs are not able to completely degrade these pollutants and hence, there is an urgent need to develop effective ways for the bioremediation of these pollutants from the ecosystem. Several studies have reported, key enzymes that are able to biodegrade these pollutants. Laccases, multicopper oxidases from microbes like bacteria and fungi are shown to eradicate some concentration of pharmaceutical pollutants. Hence, study of interaction of laccases with different pharmaceutical pollutants in necessary. In this study, we have screened pharmaceutical pollutants and studied their interactions with the target enzyme. After that we predicted the synthetic pathways of biodegradation for target compound, carbamazepine. This study will help us in predicting the potential targets. This research by leveraging in-silico tools will help also help us in predicting biodegradation pathways for various recalcitrant pollutants.