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. 2020 Sep 28;15(9):e0239841.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0239841. eCollection 2020.

Modelling bioactivities of combinations of whole extracts of edibles with a simplified theoretical framework reveals the statistical role of molecular diversity and system complexity in their mode of action and their nearly certain safety

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Modelling bioactivities of combinations of whole extracts of edibles with a simplified theoretical framework reveals the statistical role of molecular diversity and system complexity in their mode of action and their nearly certain safety

Pascal Mayer. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Network pharmacology and polypharmacology are emerging as novel drug discovery paradigms. The many discovery, safety and regulatory issues they raise may become tractable with polypharmacological combinations of natural compounds found in whole extracts of edible and mixes thereof. The primary goal of this work is to get general insights underlying the innocuity and the emergence of beneficial and toxic activities of combinations of many compounds in general and of edibles in particular. A simplified model of compounds' interactions with an organism and of their desired and undesired effects is constructed by considering the departure from equilibrium of interconnected biological features. This model allows to compute the scaling of the probability of significant effects relative to nutritional diversity, organism complexity and synergy resulting from mixing compounds and edibles. It allows also to characterize massive indirect perturbation mode of action drugs as a potential novel multi-compound-multi-target pharmaceutical class, coined Ediceuticals when based on edibles. Their mode of action may readily target differentially organisms' system robustness as such based on differential complexity for discovering nearly certainly safe novel antimicrobials, antiviral and anti-cancer treatments. This very general model provides also a theoretical framework to several pharmaceutical and nutritional observations. In particular, it characterizes two classes of undesirable effects of drugs, and may question the interpretation of undesirable effects in healthy subjects. It also formalizes nutritional diversity as such as a novel statistical supra-chemical parameter that may contribute to guide nutritional health intervention. Finally, it is to be noted that a similar formalism may be further applicable to model whole ecosystems in general.

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Conflict of interest statement

This work was financially supported by Alphanosos. The author is an employee, corporate representative, manager, and shareholder of Alphanosos. This does not alter the author’s adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials. The following patents, marketed products, or products in development are related to this work: - Patent family, applied for in 71 countries, including WO2018083115 and US2019255136 - Ediceutical based antibiotics and anti-cancer actives (preclinical research) - Cosmetic ingredients: Synherbs®4.5, Synherbs®5.1, Synherbs®5.2 - Veterinary hygiene products Effiskin®, PhytoPyo,®, CaniPerfect® - Cosmetic product Mokaskin® - Alternatives to antibiotics for agriculture (preregistration research)

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1. Variation of Xω with the complexity c for different values of ω.
See text.
Fig 2
Fig 2. Variation of W with the relative diversity γ for different values of Xω.
See text.

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Grants and funding

This work was financially supported by Alphanosos. The author is an employee, corporate representative, manager, and shareholder of Alphanosos. The funder had no other role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.