Study on the Drug Targets and Molecular Mechanisms of in the Treatment of Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma Based on Network Pharmacology.

AIM

To analyse the target of in nasopharyngeal carcinoma by using network pharmacological techniques and to explore the associated molecular mechanism.

METHODS

The targets of nasopharyngeal carcinoma were retrieved from the GeneCards database. At the same time, the drug therapeutic targets of were obtained from the TCMSP and SymMap databases. The data were imported into the STRING database and Cytoscape 3.7.1 to construct a network of "Chinese medicine component-target-disease" interactions; then, the intersection was screened as the core antinasopharyngeal cancer targets. Through GO target function and KEGG pathway enrichment analyses of the core targets, we predicted the biological processes and key signalling pathways involved in the treatment of nasopharyngeal carcinoma.

RESULTS

Twenty-five core targets of in nasopharyngeal carcinoma were mined: TP53, BCL2 ICAM1 RXRA, TLR3 and TLR9, TNF, PTGS2, IL-6, CTSD, MMP2, MMP9, MMP14, TIMP2, ABCC1, ABCB1, ABCG2, and so on. The results of visual analysis showed that the treatment of nasopharyngeal carcinoma mainly involves leukocyte adhesion to vascular endothelial cells, positive regulation of NF-B import into the nucleus, regulation of the reactive oxygen species biosynthetic and metabolic process, regulation of the chemokine biosynthetic and metabolic process, various cancer-related signalling pathways, and a variety of cytokine signal transduction pathways, such as the NF-B, TLR, IL-17, and TNF signalling pathways.

CONCLUSION

The core targets predicted by our research can be used as molecular markers for the treatment and prediction of nasopharyngeal carcinoma. The mechanism of treatment in NPC may be related to immune regulatory pathways, the inhibition of cancer cell proliferation, metastasis, and angiogenesis, as well as the regulation of tumour microenvironment. Combined with the prediction of its associated mechanism of action, the core targets can provide targeted reference value for subsequent drug development related to .