Emerging Need of Today: Significant Utilization of Various Databases and Softwares in Drug Design and Development

In drug discovery, in silico methods have become a very important part of the process. These approaches impact the entire development process by discovering and identifying new target proteins as well as designing potential ligands with a significant reduction of time and cost. Furthermore, in silico approaches are also preferred because of reduction in the experimental use of animals as; in vivo testing for safer drug design and repositioning of known drugs. Novel software-based discovery and development such as direct/indirect drug design, molecular modelling, docking, screening, drug-receptor interaction, and molecular simulation studies are very important tools for the predictions of ligand-target interaction pattern, pharmacodynamics as well as pharmacokinetic properties of ligands. On the other part, the computational approaches can be numerous, requiring interdisciplinary studies and the application of advanced computer technology to design effective and commercially feasible drugs. This review mainly focuses on the various databases and software used in drug design and development to speed up the process.