Exploring the Regulatory Mechanism of Modified Huanglian Maidong Decoction on Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus Biological Network Based on Systematic Pharmacology.

Objective: To explore the mechanism of modified Huanglian Maidong decoction (Maidong-Sanqi-Huanglian Compounds, MSHCs) intervention in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM).

Method: This study used PubChem and SciFinder to collect the molecular structure of MSHCs, used PharmMapper to predict the potential targets of MSHC, and combined them with the T2DM gene to construct MSHC-T2DM protein-protein interaction (PPI) network. The plugin MCODE in Cytoscape 3.7.1 was then used to perform cluster analysis on the MSHC-T2DM PPI network. The genes and targets were input into DAVID for Gene Ontology (GO) and pathway enrichment analysis. Finally, animal experiments were performed to verify the therapeutic effect of MSHC on T2DM.

Results: Several T2DM-related targets, clusters, signaling pathways, and biological processes are found. The experimental results showed that compared with the blank group, the content of fasting blood glucose (FBG) in the model group was higher ( < 0.01). Compared with the model group, the content of FBG decreased and the insulin level increased in the MSHC medium-dose (0.15 g/kg) and high-dose (0.45 g/kg) groups and metformin group after 4 weeks of drug administration ( < 0.05). MSHC can also improve blood liquid levels and inflammatory factor levels ( < 0.05).

Conclusion: MSHC may achieve therapeutic effects through regulating the T2DM-related targets, biological processes, and pathways, such as insulin resistance, energy metabolism, oxidative stress, and inflammation, found in this research.