Study on Mechanism of Liuwei Dihuang Pills in Treating Alzheimer’s Disease Based on Network Pharmacology

OBJECTIVE To explore the mechanism of Liuwei Dihuang pills in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease(AD) based on network pharmacology. METHODS The active ingredients of Liuwei Dihuang pills in the treatment of AD were screened from the TCMSP database, and the drugs-targets network and protein-protein interaction(PPI) network were constructed. GO analysis, KEGG pathway enrichment analysis and PPI network analysis were performed by bioinformatics analysis methods. The main results of network pharmacology were verified by real-time quantitative PCR. RESULTS The results showed that the targets of Liuwei Dihuang pills were mainly associated with in AD β amyloid protein aggregation, Tau protein phosphorylation, apoptosis, inflammation, oxidative stress response, autophagy and insulin metabolism regulation, etc. In vitro experiments indicated that Liuwei Dihuang pills was involved in the regulation of β amyloid protein aggregation by APP, Tau protein phosphorylation mediated by GSK-3β, inflammation mediated by GNB1, apoptosis mediated by Caspase-3, oxidative stress response mediated by MAOB, autophagy mediated by mTOR, as well as insulin metabolism mediated by INSR. CONCLUSION Liuwei Dihuang pills applied for treating AD has the advantages of multi-components and targets, which can provide references for further research on mechanism.