Mechanism of Xiaozheng Huoluo prescription in preventing liver fibrosis in rats via the ERK5 pathway: An analysis based on network pharmacology / 临床肝胆病杂志

ABSTRACT

ObjectiveTo investigate the mechanism of Xiaozheng Huoluo prescription (XZHLF) in the prevention and treatment of liver fibrosis based on network pharmacology. MethodsTCMSP database, Chemistry Database, ETCM database, chemical source network database, ChemSrc database, and PubChem database were searched and a literature review was performed to collect the chemical components of each traditional Chinese medicine of XZHLF, Swiss ADME database was used to screen out the active components of each traditional Chinese medicine of XZHLF, and Swiss Target Prediction database was used to predict the targets of these active components; GeneCards and OMIN databases were used to collect the disease targets of liver fibrosis, and Venn diagrams were used to obtain the potential targets of XZHLF in the prevention and treatment of liver fibrosis. Cytoscape 3.7.1 software was used to establish a “drug-active component” network for XZHLF and an “active component-potential target” network for XZHLF in the prevention and treatment of liver fibrosis. Metascape database was used to perform GO and KEGG enrichment analysis of potential targets, and bubble charts were plotted for the top 20 pathways with the highest number of enriched genes. The MAPK signaling pathway among the top 20 KEGG pathways was analyzed to plot an “active component-potential target-pathway” network. Healthy Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly divided into blank control group (K group), model group (M group), colchicine-positive control group (Y group), high-dose XZHLF group (G group), middle-dose XZHLF group (Z Group), and low-dose XZHLF group (D group), and a rat model of liver fibrosis was established by CCl4; the drug was administered simultaneously for 8 weeks. Western blot was used to measure the protein expression of ERK5, p-ERK5, MEK5, and MEKK3 in liver tissue. A one-way analysis of variance was used for comparison of continuous data between multiple groups, and the least significant difference t-test was used for further comparison between two groups. ResultsA total of 110 active components were screened out from XZHLF and they acted on 923 targets, which were mapped to 6823 disease targets of liver fibrosis to obtain 647 potential targets. XZHLF might act on multiple protein targets such as EGFR, AKT1, IKBKB, MAPK8, and PDGFRB through the pathways including the MAPK signaling pathway and the biological processes including the regulation of MAPK cascade, thereby playing a role in the prevention and treatment of liver fibrosis. The M group had significant increases in the protein levels of ERK5, p-ERK5, MEK5, and MEKK3 in liver tissue compared with the K, Y, G, Z, and D groups (all P ＜0.05), and the K group had significant reductions in the protein levels of ERK5, p-ERK5, MEK5, and MEKK3 in liver tissue compared with the Y, G, Z, and D groups (all P ＜0.05). ConclusionBased on the method of network pharmacology, it is predicted that XZHLF may prevent and treat liver fibrosis via the MAPK signaling pathway, and it is verified through experiments that XZHLF prevents and treats liver fibrosis via the ERK5 pathway in the MAPK signaling pathway family. The high-dose XZHLF group shows the most obvious anti-liver fibrosis effect.