Abstract
Background Calculus Bovis is a valuable Chinese medicine, which is widely used in the clinical treatment of ischemic stroke. The present study is aimed at investigating its target and the mechanism involved in ischemic stroke treatment by network pharmacology. Methods Effective compounds of Calculus Bovis were collected using methods of network pharmacology and using the Bioinformatics Analysis Tool for Molecular Mechanism of Traditional Chinese Medicine (BATMAN-TCM) and the Traditional Chinese Medicine Systems Pharmacology Database and Analysis Platform (TCMSP). Potential compound targets were searched in the TCMSP and SwissTargetPrediction databases. Ischemic stroke-related disease targets were searched in the Drugbank, DisGeNet, OMIM, and TTD databases. These two types of targets were uploaded to the STRING database, and a network of their interaction (PPI) was built with its characteristics calculated, aiming to reveal a number of key targets. Hub genes were selected using a plug-in of the Cytoscape software, and Gene Ontology (GO) biological processes and pathway enrichment analyses of Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) were conducted using the clusterProfiler package of R language. Results Among 12 compounds, deoxycorticosterone, methyl cholate, and biliverdin were potentially effective components. A total of 344 Calculus Bovis compound targets and 590 ischemic stroke targets were found with 92 overlapping targets, including hub genes such as TP53, AKT, PIK2CA, MAPK3, MMP9, and MMP2. Biological functions of Calculus Bovis are associated with protein hydrolyzation, phosphorylation of serine/threonine residues of protein substrates, peptide bond hydrolyzation of peptides and proteins, hydrolyzation of intracellular second messengers, antioxidation and reduction, RNA transcription, and other biological processes. Conclusion Calculus Bovis may play a role in ischemic stroke by activating PI3K-AKT and MAPK signaling pathways, which are involved in regulating inflammatory response, cell apoptosis, and proliferation.
Highlights
Stroke is an acute cerebrovascular disease with typical clinical manifestations of sudden weakness in one side of the face, arms, or legs; sudden faintness; and unconsciousness
Potential targets could be searched in the TCMSP and SwissTargetPrediction databases [22] to further confirm the targets of compounds derived from Calculus Bovis
Network pharmacology was used in this study to investigate Calculus Bovis itself and its potential mechanism for the treatment of ischemic stroke through compound target network construction, Protein-Protein Interaction (PPI) network analysis, Gene Ontology (GO) enrichment analysis, and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analysis
Summary
Stroke is an acute cerebrovascular disease with typical clinical manifestations of sudden weakness in one side of the face, arms, or legs; sudden faintness; and unconsciousness. Effective compounds of Calculus Bovis were collected using methods of network pharmacology and using the Bioinformatics Analysis Tool for Molecular Mechanism of Traditional Chinese Medicine (BATMAN-TCM) and the Traditional Chinese Medicine Systems Pharmacology Database and Analysis Platform (TCMSP). Ischemic stroke-related disease targets were searched in the Drugbank, DisGeNet, OMIM, and TTD databases. These two types of targets were uploaded to the STRING database, and a network of their interaction (PPI) was built with its characteristics calculated, aiming to reveal a number of key targets. A total of 344 Calculus Bovis compound targets and 590 ischemic stroke targets were found with 92 overlapping targets, including hub genes such as TP53, AKT, PIK2CA, MAPK3, MMP9, and MMP2. Calculus Bovis may play a role in ischemic stroke by activating PI3KAKT and MAPK signaling pathways, which are involved in regulating inflammatory response, cell apoptosis, and proliferation
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