Analysis of the pharmacological mechanism of Roucongrong in treating osteoporosis based on a biological network module

Background: The network pharmacology method can be used to predict the active components, targets, and key signal transduction pathways of Roucongrong. This method has been explored in the treatment of osteoporosis. Methods: The effective ingredients and targets of Roucongrong were obtained by searching the TCMSP database. By combining OMIM, and the GeneCards database, the disease targets of osteoporosis were obtained. We determined the common goals of drugs and diseases and performed PPI network analysis on the STRING platform. The obtained data was constructed using Cytoscape software to construct a network module to perform functional annotation of GO terminology and analysis of the KEGG signal path. Results: A total of 6 active ingredients were screened and identified from Roucongrong, and 223 potential targets of the active ingredients were identified from traditional Chinese medicine. In addition, we found 1086 osteoporosis-related targets in two complete databases, and determined the intersection of disease targets and potential targets of the active ingredients; a total of 59 common targets were identified. The results show that the mechanism of Roucongrong in the treatment of osteoporosis is related to aging, response to drug, angiogenesis, positive regulation of gene expression, extracellular space, extracellular region, cytokine activity, and enzyme binding, mainly through Rheumatoid arthritis, Chagas disease (American trypanosomiasis) and Pathways in cancer to achieve the therapeutic effect. Conclusions: The mechanism of Roucongrong in the treatment of osteoporosis is directly or indirectly related to multiple signaling pathways, mainly involving aging and cytokine activity, as well as response to drug, angiogenesis, positive regulation of gene expression, extracellular space, extracellular region, and enzyme binding, etc. Systematic comprehensive intervention is used to achieve the effect of treating osteoporosis. It provides a theoretical reference for further research on the material basis and mechanism of action of Roucongrong on anti-osteoporosis.