Network pharmacology and an in silico-based study to identify proinflammatory pathways and promising bioactive polyphenols for the treatment of sickle cell anemia

Abstract

Abstract Sickle cell anemia (SCA) is a disease transmitted as an autosomal recessive Mendelian trait. It causes symptoms that worsen with age, such as acute and chronic pain, chest syndrome, pulmonary hypertension, stroke, kidney disease, and vaso-occlusive crises (VOCs), which are the leading cause of hospitalization and premature death. Although there are existing treatments to manage it, side effects related to VOCs such as patients’ inflammatory state requires the review of options for its control. In this sense, the study of polyphenols represents a potential alternative for the treatment of ACS due to their widely reported anti-inflammatory capacities. This research identified hub genes associated with inflammatory processes in SCA by extracting differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in a GEO dataset collection. Then, polyphenols with anti-inflammatory activity were selected from natural product databases, subsequently, molecular docking was performed with the polyphenols and the key protein derived from the selected hub genes. Finally, molecular dynamics were performed on the promising complexes. The comparative analysis allowed us to find 10 genes associated with proinflammatory pathways in SCA (MX1, FIT1, IFIT3, STAT1, ISG15, GBP1, OAS1, OAS2, OAS3, and RSAD); among them, STAT1 was selected as a central gene by regulating the expression of the rest. Docking and dynamics studies showed good binding energies among STAT1 and the fifteen polyphenolic extracted compounds, with quercetin, diosmetin, and fisetin showing the lowest binding energies. These flavonoids have been described in the past as compounds having anti-inflammatory and antioxidant features, as well as possible alternatives for SCA treatment.