Taking cabozantinib as leading compound, 13 novel small molecular c-Met inhibitors were designed and synthesized based on the obtained structure-activity relationships (SARs) of c-Met inhibitors. The structures of compounds were confirmed by ¹H NMR, ¹³C NMR and HR-MS. In vitro anti-tumor activity was evaluated by MTT method, and the mechanism was preliminarily disclosed by real-time dynamic living cell imaging and flow cytometry analysis. The results indicated that most of compounds showed good inhibition activity against human non-small-cell carcinoma cell A549 and human colorectal cancer cell HT-29 which was superior to cabozantinb. Compounds showed excellent cytotoxity and anti-proliferative activity against HT-29, and promoted cell apoptosis.

Signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT3) is a kind of signal transduction protein involved in cell proliferation, differentiation, apoptosis and other important physiological processes in response to a large number of cytokines and growth factors in cells. It has been shown that constitutive activation of STAT3 is closely associated with oncogenesis and tumorigenesis. Inhibition of aberrant STAT3 signaling has been one of promising strategies for the development of anti-neoplastic therapeutics. The review summarizes the latest progress of STAT3 inhibitors in recent years from the perspective of targeting N-terminal domain, DNA binding domain, SH2 domain and C-terminal transactivation domain of STAT3.

The study aims to explore the effects of N-p--chlorobenzenesulfonyl-4-amino salicylic acid on the dextran sodium sulfate (DSS)-induced ulcerative colitis in mouse. A total of 60 BALB/c mice were randomly divided into 6 groups (n=10):control group, DSS model group, 5-amino salicylic acid (5-ASA) group, and administration groups (N-p--chlorobenzenesulfonyl-4-aminosalicylic acid) 10, 20, 40 mg·kg^-1. Model group were induced by drinking 4% (w/v) DSS solution for 7 days and normal water for the next 3 days. The positive group and drug group mouse were given 5-ASA (40 mg·kg^-1) and N-p--chlorobenzene sulfonyl-4-amino salicylic acid (10, 20, 40 mg·kg^-1) by gavage respectively. During the experiment, changes in body weight, bloody stool, fecal character and mental status were observed daily. Damage and repair of the colon mucosa and the pathological changes of important organs were observed by hematoxylin and eosin (HE) staining. Expression of inflammatory factors such as tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), interleukin 1 beta (IL-1β), interleukin 6 (IL-6), macrophage inflammatory protein 2 (MIP-2), myeloperoxidase (MPO) in serum were detected by ELISA. The results showed that bloody stools and diarrhea emerged on the 4^th day after model establishment in model mice. The number of bloody mice rose to ten, and blood and diarrhea began to appear in the administration group on the 7^th day. Mental status was poor and body weight decreased significantly in model group since the 4^th day, and the situation was improved in the administration group and 5-ASA group. Colons in the administration groups (10, 20, 40 mg·kg^-1) were longer than those in the DSS model group. In the DSS model group, the colonic mucosa and submucosa of mice exhibited severe inflammatory cell infiltration, various degrees of necrosis, proliferation. In the middle dose group (20 mg·kg^-1), the situation has improved slightly and the colonic mucosa showed mildly chronic inflammation and a small amount of inflammatory cells infiltration. The high dose group (40 mg·kg^-1) showed normal colon mucosal, relatively complete epithelial structure and few inflammatory cell infiltration. The levels of IL-1β, IL-6, TNF-α, MIP-2 and MPO in the serum of mice were lower in the administration group (40 mg·kg^-1) than in model group. Therefore, N-p--chlorobenzenesulfonyl-4-amino salicylic acid might be a feasible treatment for DSS-induced UC.

In this article, we exogenously administered glucocorticoids to rats, observed changes in the structure and function of gap junctions in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and studied the effects of glucocorticoid receptor (GR) inhibitor mifepristone on these changes. Subcutaneous injection of corticosterone (CORT) was used to increase glucocorticoid levels in rats, intragastric administration of mifepristone antagonist GR. Sucrose preference test was conducted to evaluate anhedonia. Dye transfer assay and electron microscopy were used to analyze the function and ultrastructural changes of gap junctions in astrocytes of PFC. Immunofluorescence was used to detect the expression of connexin 43 (Cx43). Animals exposed to CORT showed behavioral deficits in sucrose preference test, exhibited significant decreases in diffusion of gap junction channel-permeable dye and abnormal gap junctional ultrastructure, as well as reductions in Cx43 puncta density in the PFC. The behavioral and cellular alterations induced by CORT were reversed or blocked by treatment with the GR antagonist mifepristone. The results suggest that mifepristone can improve the gap junction function and structural damage of astrocytes in the PFC of depressive rats induced by CORT. In conclusion, the activation of the GR receptor may contribute to gap junction dysfunction in the PFC.

A rapid identification of the constituents in Gualoupi injection was developed by HILIC/Orbitrap Fusion Lumos HRMS. ACQUITY XBridge Amide column was used to isolate the constituents with large polarity. ESI with positive ion mode was employed and "Top Speed" DDA was applied in the MS² scan. Compound identification was carried out by using Compound Discoverer software through comparing the precursor and product ions information with those in ChemSpider and mzCloud database. As a result, 48 compounds was identified, including alkaloids, amino acid, nucleosides, nucleobases, etc., among which 25 was unambiguously identified by comparing the retention time and mass spectra information with those of reference standards. In general, the main constituents from Gualoupi injection were explained in this study. Additionally, full-scan mass spectra of 21 batches of the injection were collected by the established method. Subsequently, principal component analysis (PCA) with the peak area as the observation ID was employed to analyze the discrimination of different bathes of samples. The results indicated that the batch-to-batch difference was generally from the crude drug, and the preparation process of this injection was relatively stable. In conclusion, a rapid and effective method for the identification of compounds in Gualoupi injection was established by using UHPLC-Orbitrap Fusion Lumos HRMS and the inter-bath stability was also investigated, which may make a great contribution to the study of the bioactive ingredients in Gualoupi injection and also provide vital evidence for the standard promotion.

The mechanism of detoxification of Chebulae Fructus against Aconiti kusnezoffii radix toxicity, which was known as Mongolian medical theory, was studied by establishing network of active components-targets-pathways of detoxification and enrichment analysis of targets and pathways based on network pharmacology. Firstly, the targets of active components collected from TCMSP and TCM Database@Taiwan were obtained through SwissTargetPrediction compared with disease targets from OMIM, TTD, DiGSeE. Then, the target enrichment analysis of GO functional annotations and KEGG pathways and protein function were analyzed by Metascape, furthermore, the action between main active ingredients and targets was assessed by SystemsDock Web Site. At last, the Cytoscape was used to construct the network of active components-targets-pathways. In conclusion, there were 15 components and 40 targets related to the cardiotoxicity caused by Aconiti kusnezoffii radix. Furthermore, Chebulae Fructus could regulate cardiac function to detoxify the toxicity by Aconiti kusnezoffii radix through the biological process of negative regulation of blood vessel diameter, regulation of ion transport circulatory system process, muscle contraction inorganic ion homeostasis and the pathways of neuroactive ligand-receptor interaction, calcium signaling pathway, adrenergic signaling in cardiomyocytes, etc.

Wu-tou decoction (WTD) and Baihu-Guizhi decoction (BHGZD) as described in the Synopsis of the Golden Chamber have been used extensively for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) with apparent therapeutic efficacy. However, characteristics of pharmacological effects and their underlying molecular mechanisms have not been fully elucidated due to a lack of appropriate scientific methodology. In the current study, we performed an integrative approach applying gene expression profiling and network analysis to examine the therapeutic effects and molecular mechanisms of WTD and BHGZD based on adjuvant-induced arthritis (AIA) animal model. Results demonstrated that both WTD and BHGZD could relieve the severity of arthritis in AIA rats, while the significant differences were observed in the changes of the withdrawal response scores and latency time of AIA rats treated with WTD and BHGZD. Mechanistically, our network pharmacology-based investigation demonstrated that the major candidate targets of WTD and BHGZD were significantly associated with several inflammation-immune regulatory pathways, such as Toll-like receptor signaling pathway, T cell receptor signaling pathway, cytokine-cytokine receptor interaction, chemokine signaling pathway, B cell receptor signaling pathway, antigen processing and presentation, Fc epsilon RI signaling pathway, natural killer cell mediated cytotoxicity, as well as leukocyte transendothelial migration. In particular, the major candidate targets of WTD were also involved in the regulation of hormone and energy metabolism, which might be imbalanced during RA progression. In conclusion, the current study revealed differences and similarities regarding the effects and network regulatory mechanisms of WTD and BHGZD. These findings may present a scientific basis for elucidation of mechanisms by which WTD and BHGZD alleviates RA.

This study was designed to explore the mechanism of total flavonoids of Astragali Radix (TFA) in treating nephrotic syndrome through establishing the active components-targets network and protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks and analyzing the functions and pathways involved in the targets. The main active ingredients of TFA were obtained by ¹H NMR and LC-MS, TCMSP and TCMID database. PharmMapper, SEA, SIB, HOME-NCBI-GENE, GeneCards and OMIM were used to predict and screen the active components of TFA. The Cytoscape software was used to construct the active components-targets network and protein-protein interactions network. The relation between the main active ingredients and targets were validated by Systems Dock Web Site. The GO and KEGG pathways involved in the targets were analyzed by ClueGO software. The target organ distribution was assigned by the BioGPS database. The results showed that 29 active components and 50 targets of TFA were screened and predicted. The network results showed that the TFA were mainly involved in biological processes such as inflammatory reaction process, oxidative stress process, apoptosis and autophagy, and played a role in the regulation of AGE-RAGE, PI3K/Akt, VEGF, IL-17 and MAPK signaling pathways to treat the nephrotic syndrome. This study reflects the characteristics of multi-components, multi-targets and multi-pathways of TFA, which provides new ideas and clues for further research on the mechanism of anti-nephrotic syndrome effects of TFA.

The medication rules of high frequency herb-pairs containing Codonopsis pilosula (Dangshen) were analyzed with data mining tools, and the molecular mechanisms of these herb-pairs on the gastrointestinal diseases were predicted with the network pharmacology. The R language association rules were used to mine the high frequency herb-pairs from TCM formulae containing Dangshen, and these herb-pairs would be screened out, which satisfied the following requirements with support ≥ 0.3 and confidence ≥ 0.9 at the same time. Using the Integrated Pharmacology Platform of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCMIP) to predict the key core targets of the high frequency herb-pairs, the network of Chinese medicine-compound-target-pathway related to Dangshen were built to explore the preventing and treating molecular mechanism on gastrointestinal diseases. At last, the relation of the main active components from Dangshen and its herbal pairs with target proteins were validated by Systems Dock Web Site. The 185 formulae were selected from 543 formulae containing Dangshen, and 6 herbal pairs with Dangshen, which includes Angelica (Danggui), Licorice (Gancao), Atractylodes macrocephala (Baizhu), Poria cocos (Fuling), dried tangerine peel (Chenpi) and Astragalus membranaceus (Huangqi), were discovered with Apriori algorithm. The combination of 6 herbal pairs is similar to Bu Zhong Yi Qi Decoction; 6 herbal pairs with Dangshen were related to the target of POMC, OPRM1, CCR9 and HTR2C in TCMIP. The known targets (HTR2C, POMC, OPRM1, CCR9, OPRD1) and potential drug-targets (GNB1, GCK, SDHD, SLC25A2, DHRS4) for gastrointestinal diseases were predicted about the high frequency pairs with Dangshen. The results of GO enrichment analysis showed that the biological function was mainly located in the mitochondria and myelin sheath, and involved in the biological processes of three carboxylic acid cycle, platelet activation, and aspartic acid metabolism. KEGG pathway enrichment analysis showed that the main metabolic pathways related with Dangshen pairs involved amino acid metabolism, energy metabolism and endocrine metabolism. The prediction results showed many targets of the frequency herbal pairs with Dangshen preventing and treating gastrointestinal diseases were related with nerve cells. These herbal pairs could prevent and treat the gastrointestinal diseases through the neuroendocrine system and the brain gut axis.

This study was designed to explore the anti heart failure mechanisms of the compatibility of Gualou with Xiebai based on network pharmacology in rat model of myocardial ischemia-reperfusion injury. Using the databases of Traditional Chinese Medicine Database@Taiwan (TCM Database@Taiwan), Traditional Chinese Medicine Systems Pharmacology Database and Analysis Platform (TCMSP), Drug Repositioning and Adverse Drug Reaction Chemical-Protein Interactome (DRAR-CPI) and Universal Protein Resource (Uniprot) to screen compounds and predict the target of active components, the Database for Annotation, Visualization, and Integrated Discovery (DAVID) database, we predicted the biological pathway and signal pathway in the compatibility of Gualou with Xiebai. The effects of Gualou Xiebai dropping pills on the apoptosis of myocardial cells and the expression of protein kinase B (Akt), p-Akt and cysteine aspartate-specific proteinase (caspase-3) protein were examined in the related signal pathway phosphatidylinositol-3-kinase/protein kinase B (PI3K/Akt) of myocardial ischemia reperfusion injury in rats. Twenty two compounds, such as 10 α-cucurbita-5, 24-diene-3β-ol and macrostemonoside were found to protect rats from heart failure through multiple targets, multiple biological pathways and multiple pathways, involving biological pathways such as hormone stimulation reaction, phosphorylation, apoptosis regulation, and signaling pathways such as insulin, mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK), cell apoptosis and so on. After the intervention of Gualou Xiebai dropping pills, the PI3K-Akt signaling pathway was activated to promote the phosphorylation of Akt protein, reduce the expression of caspase-3 protein, inhibit apoptosis and protect the myocardium. The data verify the results of the network pharmacology, and explain the mechanisms of anti-heart failure activity of combination of Gualou with Xiebai.