Pharmacological Mechanisms Underlying the Neuroprotective Effects of Alpinia oxyphylla Miq. on Alzheimer’s Disease

Abstract

Alpinia oxyphylla Miq. (i.e., A. oxyphylla), a traditional Chinese medicine, can exert neuroprotective effects in ameliorating mild cognitive impairment and improving the pathological hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Here, 50 active compounds and 164 putative targets were collected and identified with 251 clinically tested AD-associated target proteins using network pharmacology approaches. Based on the Gene Ontology/Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway enrichments, the compound-target-pathway-disease/protein-protein interaction network constructions, and the network topological analysis, we concluded that A. oxyphylla may have neuroprotective effects by regulating neurotransmitter function, as well as brain plasticity in neuronal networks. Moreover, closely-related AD proteins, including the amyloid-beta precursor protein, the estrogen receptor 1, acetylcholinesterase, and nitric oxide synthase 2, were selected as the bottleneck nodes of network for further verification by molecular docking. Our analytical results demonstrated that terpene, as the main compound of A. oxyphylla extract, exerts neuroprotective effects, providing new insights into the development of a natural therapy for the prevention and treatment of AD.

Eudesmane and Eremophilane Sesquiterpenes from the Fruits of Alpinia oxyphylla with Protective Effects against Oxidative Stress in Adipose-Derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells

“…A. oxyphylla is commonly used for its antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and neuroprotective effects, but the effects of its active compounds remain to be explored [ 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 ]. In the present study, we successfully proved the protective effects of 13 isolated sesquiterpenes on the viability of ADMSCs exposed to tBHP-induced oxidative stress.…”

A network pharmacology based approach for predicting active ingredients and potential mechanism of Lianhuaqingwen capsule in treating COVID-19

“…The target protein three-dimensional (3D) structures were obtained from the PDB database and processed using the PyMol software (version 1.7.2.1) 30 , 31 , including removing the ligands, correcting protein structure, and removing water. The proteins and ligands were converted to the PDBQT format in the AutoDockTools (version1.5.6) prior to performing the docking process 32 , 33 . Because the active side of 3CL pro is centered on the amino acid residues of the original ligand, the “active pocket” was constructed as follows: grid center -10.817, 11.746, 68.213 and NPTS 42, 60, 42, 0.375.…”

Exploring the Pharmacological Mechanisms of Tripterygium Wilfordii Hook F against Cardiovascular Disease Using Network Pharmacology and Molecular Docking

“…In this paper, the compound name "leigongteng" was inputted to the TCMSP database and active ingredients with DL 0.18 and OB 30% were selected for subsequent analysis. Then SMILES and PubChem ID of candidate components were collected by using the Traditional Chinese Medicines Integrated Database (TCMID, http://www.megabionet.org/tcmid/) [53] and the PubChem (https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) database [54].…”