Evaluation of In Vitro Antiprotease Activity of Selected Traditional Medicinal Herbs in Dentistry and Its In Silico PASS Prediction.

Background: Dental/oral diseases are one of the significant public health problems globally. Herbal medicines for managing oral diseases are considered an effective alternative to synthetic compounds due to their lower side effect. Azadirachta indica, Terminalia chebula, Camellia sinensis, and Piper nigrum are used to control and prevent oral inflammations in dentistry. In this study, we have evaluated the protease inhibition activity of these plant extracts, and further, the binding mode of the active ingredient of these plants with trypsin was studied using molecular docking. Methods: In this study, protease inhibition activity was carried out using aqueous extracts of the plant parts such as Azadirachta indica (neem) twig, Terminalia chebula (Haritaki) fruit, Camellia sinensis (green tea) powder, and Piper nigrum (kali miri) seed. Next, to explore the binding mode of active ingredients azadirachtin, chebuligenic acid, catechin, and piperine with trypsin, we employed a molecular docking study using AutoDock4.2. Results: The results revealed that the Azadirachta indica plant extract showed an IC50 value of 96.19 µg mL-1, Camellia sinensis IC50 value of 188.50 µg mL-1, Piper nigrum IC50 value of 371.20 µg mL-1, and Terminalia chebula IC50 value of 639.48 µg mL-1, when compared with standard drug diclofenac sodium, had IC50 value 93.00 µg mL-1. Further, the docking result reveals that all the main active ingredients of these plants have significant binding affinity and prefer the same binding pocket of trypsin. Conclusion: Hence, our results show the importance of traditional plants Azadirachta indica, Terminalia chebula, green tea, and Piper nigrum to control oral disease conditions. As they show significant protease inhibition activity, hence, the active ingredient could act as a potential anti-inflammatory agent and further help to prevent or control oral disease conditions such as gingivitis and periodontitis.

Relationship and inter observer agreement of tooth and face forms in a Saudi subpopulation.

OBJECTIVE: To determine the relationship of tooth form with the face form by different observers and further investigate the inter observer agreement on tooth forms, face forms, their relationship among male Saudis. STUDY DESIGN: A comparative cross-sectional study. PLACE AND DURATION OF STUDY: Department of Prosthodontics, College of Dentistry, King Saud University, Riyadh, KSA, from February till August 2013. METHODOLOGY: Ninety four male participants aged 18 - 35 years were randomly recruited for the study. Full-face and anterior teeth (intraoral) digital photographs in the frontal plane were recorded. The outline tracings of the face and the tooth were obtained using Autocad (version 2010) software. The outline of the tooth was enlarged proportionately, without altering the length to width ratio to fit the face outline. The outlines were then evaluated visually by 6 prosthodontists and results were tabulated. RESULTS: The most common type of face form (49.65%) and tooth form (56.38%) was square tapering. Using the visual method, a good relationship (31.41%), moderate relationship (35.31%), weak relationship (19.68%) and no relationship (13.65%) between the tooth form and face form was found by the observers. Overall kappa for inter observer agreement on face form, tooth form and their relationship was 0.24, 0.17 and 0.26 respectively. The kappa values showed a fair agreement between the observers. CONCLUSION: The study results indicated that there was no highly defined relationship between the tooth form and face form in the studied Saudi subpopulation. A fair agreement was found between the observers for classifying the tooth forms, face froms and their relationship.