In silico molecular docking of astaxanthin and sorafenib with different apoptotic proteins involved in hepatocellular carcinoma

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most common type of primary liver cancer. Several signaling pathways are involved in Hepatocellular carcinoma. Sorafenib is used as positive drug for Hepatocellular carcinoma. Astaxanthin is a keto carotenoid with pinkish red colour found in various sea foods, shrimp, salmon, crab and lobster which have major role as anticancer drug. In silico molecular docking was performed to Astaxanthin and Sorafenib with growth factor receptors like VEGFR2, EGFR; apoptotic proteins like Bcl2, Caspase 3 and Caspase 9 by computational method to prove the mechanism of Astaxanthin and Sorafenib as anticancer agent. Our study, suggest that better docking score was obtained by astaxanthin when compared to sorafenib the positive drug. Hence, astaxanthin can be used as a potent drug against various HCC drug targets.