ObjectiveTo explore the mechanism of Jiuwei Jiangtang Oral Liquid for the treatment of diabetic nephropathy based on network pharmacology and molecular docking technique.MethodsAfter screening the active components of various flavors of Traditional Chinese Medicines in Jiuwei Jiangtang Oral Liquid from the Traditional Chinese Medicine Systems Pharmacology Database and Analysis Platform, Integrative Pharmacology-based Research Platform of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and Guided Database of Traditional Chinese Medicine, the SwissTargetPrediction database and UniProt database were used to obtain their corresponding effect targets. The GeneCards and DisGeNET databases were used to retrieve targets related to diabetic nephropathy, and then the intersection between the two categories of targets was acquired. On the basis of the intersection targets, the STRING database and Cytoscape 3.8.3 software were employed to establish protein-protein interaction network and drug-component-target-disease visual regulatory network for screening the core targets and the core active components, respectively. The functional enrichment analysis and pathway enrichment analysis were conducted by using the Metascape database. The molecular docking validation on the core active components and the proteins of core targets were conducted by using the AutoDockTools 1.5.7 software. ResultsA total of 84 active components in Jiuwei Jiangtang Oral Liquid were obtained, including 1078 effect targets of active components, 613 targets related to diabetic nephropathy, and 169 intersection targets. The core active components were quercetin, daidzein, puerarin,kaempferol,4′-methoxypuerarin,isorhamnetin, formononetin,β-sitosterol, ellagic acid,geniposide, and calycosin; furthermore, the core targets were GAPDH, tumor necrosis factor (TNF), interleukin (IL)-6, serine/threonine protein kinase (AKT)1, vascular endothelial growth factor A (VEGFA), tumor protein 53 (TP53),and IL-1β. The results of enrichment analyses revealed that the intersection targets were mainly involved in biological processes of responses to hormone, peptide, inorganic substance, nitrogen compound, etc., were enriched in cellular compositions of membrane raft, membrane microdomain, plasma membrane raft, etc., were mainly involved in molecular functions in terms of protein kinase activity, phosphotransferase activity with alcohol as receptor, kinase activity, etc., and were involved in signaling pathways with respect to phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K)/AKT signaling pathway, advanced glycation end-products (AGE)-receptor for advanced glycation end-products (RAGE) signaling pathway in diabetic complications, mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling pathway, hypoxia inducible factor 1 (HIF-1) signaling pathway, TNF signaling pathway, and IL-17 signaling pathway, etc. The results of molecular docking indicated that the docking results of the core active components and the core targets were favorable. ConclusionMultiple active components of Jiuwei Jiangtang Oral Liquid may regulate AGE-RAGE signaling pathway, PI3K/AKT signaling pathway, MAPK signaling pathway, HIF-1 signaling pathway, TNF signaling pathway, IL-17 signaling pathway, and other signaling pathways, thereby affecting inflammatory responses and oxidative stresses, so as to affect the occurrence and development of diabetic nephropathy through acting on GAPDH, TNF, IL-6, AKT1,VEGFA, TP53, IL-1β, and other targets.

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