ABSTRACT:
Network pharmacology is a new paradigm that has revolutionized the field of drug discovery and disease mechanism study, changing the focus from the single target to multi targets and systems level analysis. The discipline combines bioinformatics, cheminformatics, and systems biology, and allows mapping of drug–target–pathway interactions giving a comprehensive overview of the therapeutic potential. Network pharmacology is different from conventional pharmacology, which tends to focus on a single target at a time.Network pharmacology is a different approach from conventional pharmacology, which typically considers a single target at a time, and explicitly takes into account the interconnectedness of signaling cascades, metabolic pathways, and protein–protein interactions. It has been especially useful in the investigation of complex diseases, like cancer, diabetes, and neurodegenerative diseases, in which there are several pathways leading to disease. The AMPK–mTOR pathway analysis has led to the use of metformin in oncology, and curcumin has been seen to have multi target anti inflammatory effects in neurodegeneration. Likewise, herbal products such as Withania somnifera have been deciphered for their synergistic neuroprotective activity. Although the data is far from complete, and the computational predictions are necessary, network pharmacology is still moving forward in the fields of drug repurposing, polypharmacology, and personalized medicine. Future directions are integration with multi omics data, patient specific network modeling and precision pharmacology. In summary, the overall picture of network pharmacology is rather comprehensive and can integrate reductionist pharmacology with systems biology, which can promote innovation of therapeutic development and understanding of mechanisms.