Utilizing network pharmacological analysis to investigate the key targets and mechanisms of kaempferol against oxaliplatin-induced neurotoxicity

Abstract

This study investigated the pharmacological mechanism of kaempferol in the treatment of oxaliplatin-induced neuropathic pain by network pharmacological method and cells experiment. The kaempferol and disease target genes were obtained from several databases, including TCMSP, SwissTargetPrediction, GeneCards, and CTD. Then, the common target genes of drugs and diseases were obtained using Venny online tools. Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) functional analyses were carried out to obtain the enriched molecular pathways associated with the kaempferol and disease. Finally, we constructed a neuropathic pain cell experiment to confirm the findings. 138 intersection targets were identified between targets of kaempferol and oxaliplatin-induced neurotoxicity. Enrichment analyses revealed that the IL-17 signaling pathway was associated with the therapeutic effects of kaempferol. Kaempferol down-regulated the mRNA expression levels of TNF-α, IL-6, and CCL2 in oxaliplatin-treated astrocytes. Our findings showed that kaempferol alleviated oxaliplatin-induced neurotoxicity via regulation of inflammation-related genes.

Keywords:

• Oxaliplatin
• neuropathic pain
• network pharmacology
• kaempferol
• colorectal cancer

Disclosure statement

All authors report no conflicts of interest in the present study.

Data availability statement

All data used in this study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by a grant from the Natural Science Foundation of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (2021D01C366).