Assessing the Molecular Interaction between Poly Lactic-co-glycolic Acid (PLGA) 50:50 and Poly Ethylene Glycol in Presence of Diethyl Phthalate Using in silico Study - A Novel Approach of Pre-Formulation Study

The efficacy of a drug relies on drug formulation and targeting. Imatinib is an anti-cancer drug identified to be effective in the treatment of cancers like myeloid leukemia and lymphoblastic leukemia, and gastrointestinal tumors. The prediction of mixing energy and identification of docking interactions and scores can help identify the most efficient drug carrier/plasticizer molecule that could exert maximum pharmaceutical efficiency. The results of a preliminary study explicitly showed the potent carrier molecule before conducting formulation studies. Hence, the present study was designed to screen the interaction energies between different combinations of Poly (lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PGLA) or Poly Ethylene Glycol (PEG) or diethyl phthalate with Imatinib using in silico computational methods. The study results suggested that the binding energy and the score obtained for docking interactions for Imatinib versus diethyl phthalate was better when compared to the other combinations. Therefore, Diethyl phthalate might be a signature candidate to act as Imatinib-carrier/plasticizer. More formulation studies are warranted further to demonstrate the desired continuous drug release and maximum efficacy with Imatinib chemotherapy.