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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Endocrinol.
Sec. Bone Research
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fendo.2024.1472146

Protective effects of arecanut seed phenols in retinoic acid induced osteoporosis and the potential mechanisms explored by network pharmacology

Provisionally accepted
Minmin Tang Minmin Tang 1,2Liping Sun Liping Sun 3*Fei Song Fei Song 1,2*Hua Chen Hua Chen 1*
  • 1 Coconut Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences, Wenchang, China
  • 2 Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences, Haikou, Hainan Province, China
  • 3 Faculty of Food Science and Engineering, Kunming University of Science and Technology, Kunming City, Yunnan, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Background: Arecanut seed is an important traditional medicine in Southeast Asia. It has been presented in a clinical formula to treat osteoporosis (OP) in China. Arecanut seed is abundant in phenols. However, most of current studies mainly focused on estrogen-deficient osteoporosis (OP) model of arecanut seed phenols (ASP), there is still a lack of roundly research about molecular mechanism of ASP therapy on OP and its influence on in drug-induced bone loss.To explore potential molecular mechanisms and the effects of ASP on OP, network pharmacology, molecular docking methods and a retinoic acid-induced OP rat model were employed in this study. According to the network pharmacology method, OP related targets and ASP compound related targets were collected from databases to obtain hub targets and top active chemicals in ASP treating OP. The potential therapic pathways were also calculated. Binding capacities of top active chemicals to hub targets were analyzed by molecular dock assay. In the animal experiment, osteocalcin (OCN) levels and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity in serum of all the rats were determined. The views of bone section were stained to observe the bone micro-structure of ASP affects. Bone mineral density (BMD), cortical bone thickness (CBT), area ratio of bone cortex (CAR) and area ratio of bone trabecula (TAR) were obtained from micro computed tomography to evaluate the effectiveness of ASP on bone loss.Three hub genes and three top active compounds were screened by network pharmacology analysis and they combined well with each other. ASP had positive effects on alleviating RA-induced bone loss by regulating the expression of the hub genes. Signals in IL-17 pathway were predicted and primarily verified being potential targets in ASP treating OP.

    Keywords: arecanut seed1, Phenols2, osteoporosis3, network pharmacology4, molecular dock5

    Received: 28 Jul 2024; Accepted: 23 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Tang, Sun, Song and Chen. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    Liping Sun, Faculty of Food Science and Engineering, Kunming University of Science and Technology, Kunming City, 650500, Yunnan, China
    Fei Song, Coconut Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences, Wenchang, China
    Hua Chen, Coconut Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences, Wenchang, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.