Antidepressant pathways of the Chinese herb jiaweisinisan through genetic ontology analysis

Active compounds and corresponding targets of the traditional Chinese herb, jiaweisinisan, were obtained from systems pharmacological database and placed into ClueGO for gene ontology analysis. The targets of depression were obtained from the Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man, the Therapeutic Target Database, and the Pharmacogenomics Knowledge Base. Compound-target and target-pathway networks were constructed using Cytoscape, and then their topological parameters were analyzed. The targets of jiaweisinisan and depression were mapped to pathways, thereby constructing antidepressant pathways of jiaweisinisan. It was found that jiaweisinisan has 82 different active compounds and 306 relevant potential targets. Also, 107 unrepeatable targets related to depression were found. In all, 26 common targets were found to be the direct anti-depression targets of jiaweisinisan and 9 pathways of jiaweisinisan related to depression were divided into three modules (synaptic transmission, cell apoptosis, and immune-inflammatory). The jiaweisinisan formula was found to have synergistic antidepressant effects due to aspects of its herb composition and the active compounds therein, giving rise to potential targets and signaling pathways related to depression. Its antidepressant mechanisms were found to mainly involve the regulation of synaptic transmission, cell apoptosis, and immune-mediated inflammation.