Integrated network pharmacology and metabolomics to reveal the mechanism of Pinellia ternata inhibiting non-small cell lung cancer cells

Lung cancer is a malignant tumor with highly heterogeneous characteristics. A classic Chinese medicine, Pinellia ternata (PT), was shown to exert therapeutic effects on lung cancer cells. However, its chemical and pharmacological profiles are not yet understood. In the present study, we aimed to reveal the mechanism of PT in treating lung cancer cells through metabolomics and network pharmacology. Metabolomic analysis of two strains of lung cancer cells treated with Pinellia ternata extracts (PTE) was used to identify differentially abundant metabolites, and the metabolic pathways associated with the DEGs were identified by MetaboAnalyst. Then, network pharmacology was applied to identify potential targets against PTE-induced lung cancer cells. The integrated network of metabolomics and network pharmacology was constructed based on Cytoscape. PTE obviously inhibited the proliferation, migration and invasion of A549 and NCI-H460 cells. The results of the cellular metabolomics analysis showed that 30 metabolites were differentially expressed in the lung cancer cells of the experimental and control groups. Through pathway enrichment analysis, 5 metabolites were found to be involved in purine metabolism, riboflavin metabolism and the pentose phosphate pathway, including D-ribose 5-phosphate, xanthosine, 5-amino-4-imidazolecarboxyamide, flavin mononucleotide (FMN) and flavin adenine dinucleotide (FAD). Combined with network pharmacology, 11 bioactive compounds were found in PT, and networks of bioactive compound–target gene–metabolic enzyme–metabolite interactions were constructed. In conclusion, this study revealed the complicated mechanisms of PT against lung cancer. Our work provides a novel paradigm for identifying the potential mechanisms underlying the pharmacological effects of natural compounds.