Combined systematic pharmacology and urine metabonomics to study the therapeutic mechanism of type 2 diabetic treated with the herbal pair of Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge and Pueraria montana var. lobata (Willd.) Sanjappa & Pradeep

[Display omitted] •HPLC/LTQ-Orbitrap-MS negative and positive ion currents of DG.•LC-MS analyses of metabolic profiles.•The targets analysis related to potential biomarker.•Results of systematic pharmacology.•Study on the mechanism of DG on T2DM. The herbal pair of Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge and Pueraria montana var. lobata (Willd.) Sanjappa & Pradeep (DG) is commonly used in the treatment of type 2 diabetes (T2DM) in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). The drug pair DG was designed by Dr. Zhu chenyu to improve the treatment of T2DM. Aim: This study combined with systematic pharmacology and urine metabonomics to explore the mechanism of DG in the treatment of T2DM. Methods: The therapeutic effect of DG on T2DM was evaluated by fasting blood glucose (FBG) and biochemical indexes. Systematic pharmacology was used to screen the active components and targets that may be related to DG. Metabonomics was established to find urinary metabolites and pathways that may be induced by DG. Finally, integrate the results of these two parts for mutual verification. Results: FBG and biochemical indexes showed that DG could reduce FBG and adjust the related biochemical indexes. Metabolomics analysis indicated that 39 metabolites were related to DG for T2DM treatment. In addition, systematic pharmacology showed compounds and potential targets which were associated with DG. Finally, 12 promising targets were selected as targets for T2DM therapy by integrating the results. Conclusion: The combination of metabonomics and systematic pharmacology based on LC-MS is feasible and effective, which provides strong support for exploring the effective components and pharmacological mechanism of TCM.