CEMTDD: The database for elucidating the relationships among herbs, compounds, targets and related diseases for Chinese ethnic minority traditional drugs

Abstract

China has different ethnic minorities that establish their own medical systems and practice experience for thousand years, thereafter named Chinese Ethnic Minority Traditional Drugs (CEMTDs) (http://www.cemtdd.com/index.html). Since many compounds from CEMTDs have been reported to perturb human’s dysfunction network and restore human normal physiological conditions, the relationships amongst a series of compounds from specific herbs, their targets and relevant diseases have become our main focus in CEMTD modernization. Herein, we have constructed the first Chinese Ethnic Minority Traditional Drug Database (CEMTDD) mainly from Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), retrieving CEMTD-related information from different resources. CEMTDD contains about 621 herbs, 4, 060 compounds, 2, 163 targets and 210 diseases, among which most of herbs can be applied into gerontology therapy including inflammation, cardiovascular disease and neurodegenerative disease. Gerontology is highly occurred in XUAR, and has abundant experience in treating such diseases, which may benefit for developing a new gerontology therapeutic strategy. CEMTDD displays networks for intricate relationships between CEMTDs and treated diseases, as well as the interrelations between active compounds and action targets, which may shed new light on the combination therapy of CEMTDs and further understanding of their herb molecular mechanisms for better modernized utilizations of CEMTDs, especially in gerontology.