Professor Zeno Apostolides completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Pretoria (UP), and part of his PhD at the University of Delaware in the US, where he developed and evaluated computer simulations for teaching biochemistry, similar to the popular flight simulators used for pilots.

He joined UP as a lecturer in 1980 and has been doing research at the University for 44 years. For Prof Apostolides, UP offers a broad range of disciplines with which to collaborate, such as chemistry, veterinary, human medicine and computer science.

“My work aims to support or refute ethnobotanical claims of medicinal plants,” Prof Apostolides says. “We search for medicinal plants that may be used as teas, herbs or spices and that have ethnobotanical claims for treating type 2 diabetes. Many countries have pharmacopoeias that list medicinal plants, especially Britain, Germany, Russia, India, China and the US. The first African herbal pharmacopeia was published in 2010.”

Type 2 diabetes affects about 10% of the global population. It has a higher prevalence in low-income countries where people consume high-starch diets that are rich in cereals such as rice or maize. 

“We analyse the constituents of medicinal plants with computer simulations and laboratory experiments to investigate how effective they are in inhibiting amylase and glucosidase, which are starch-digesting enzymes.”

According to Prof Apostolides, there are good inhibitors in green and black tea, basil and cinnamon. These plants are easily available in most countries at low prices. His team is developing derivatives of the active compounds in these plants, which may be stronger inhibitors of starch-digesting enzymes, and patentable.

“So for a little higher price, we may be able to provide much stronger inhibitors of the above enzymes. This will better the world we live in, especially for low-income countries. I am the leader in this discipline. I am leading this research in collaboration with UP’s Faculty of Health Sciences.”

Finding good correlations between computer simulations and laboratory work is a highlight for Prof Apostolides.  

“Over the past two years, we’ve started using more advanced computer simulations, called molecular dynamics. These programs are available at the Centre of High-Performance Computing, which is supported by the national Department of Science and Innovation.”

Prof Apostolides adds that he’s been inspired by Prof Yukihiko Hara of Japan, who wrote a book on the health benefits of green tea and conducted several clinical trials with tea extracts.

“Prof Hara and I are working together to improve the health benefits of black tea,” Prof Apostolides says.

He hopes to develop a new derivative of a lead compound from green tea that will be a strong inhibitor of starch-digesting enzymes.

Prof Apostolides says his research matters because it integrates fieldwork on tea farms to improve the yield and quality of tea with the fundamental discipline of biochemistry to understand medicinal plants and their effects on human physiology.

“With computer simulations, we can dive deep into the structure of molecules and understand them on the level of individual atoms,” he says.

Prof Apostolides encourages students who are interested in developing new medicines, for animal or human diseases, to consider a degree in biochemistry. People with these skills, he emphasises, are highly sought after by pharmaceutical companies worldwide.