Molecular mechanism of Wutou Decoction in the treatment of osteoarthritis: a bioinformatics and molecular docking study

BACKGROUND Osteoarthritis (OA) is a chronic joint disease characterized by cartilage destruction and periarticular osteophyte formation. One therapeutic option for this condition, the Wutou Decoction (WTD) Chinese medicine formula, is satisfactory in its efficacy. Here, we used bioinformatic and molecular docking techniques to investigate the mechanism of action of WTD in the treatment of OA. METHODS The active compounds (and their target proteins) of 5 Chinese herbs in WTD were obtained by searching the Traditional Chinese Medicine Systems Pharmacology Database and Analysis Platform. The action targets of WTD for OA were obtained by searching the Therapeutic Target Database and by mining the microarray data in the Gene Expression Omnibus. Gene Ontology and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway enrichment analyses were performed to identify key targets for OA treatment with the help of Database for Annotation, Visualization, and Integrated Discovery. Based on the Cytoscape software version 3.6.1, the visual networks of the "TCM drugs-Active Compounds-Targets-Diseases" and protein-protein interaction of the key targets of WTD for the treatment of OA were constructed. The core active compounds and the key targets obtained were molecularly docked and validated. RESULTS Analyses revealed 140 active compounds in WTD, 123 of which had a total of 163 corresponding targets. In addition, 331 differentially expressed genes and 227 OA-related targets were obtained. The interaction networks among 32 key targets were identified. The biological processes of WTD in treating OA mainly involved regulation of inflammatory factors, transcription of genetic materials, cell cycle, angiogenesis, and endocrine regulation. The signaling pathways involved mainly included TNF signaling pathway, rheumatoid arthritis signaling pathway, cancer-related signals, vascular endothelial growth factor signaling pathway, and osteoclast differentiation signaling pathways. Molecular docking showed that 7 core compounds including quercetin and kaempferol had strong affinities with key target proteins for the WTD treatment of OA. CONCLUSIONS WTD with multi-component can treats OA through multi-pathway. Its active compounds, including quercetin and kaempferol, can exert their therapeutic effects on OA by acting on TNF, PTGS2, MMP2, IL-6, IL-1β, and other key targets to regulate inflammation, immunity, autophagy, and endocrine-related signaling pathways.