Caulis Polygoni Multiflori accelerates megakaryopoiesis and thrombopoiesis via activating PI3K/Akt and MEK/ERK (MAPK) signaling pathways

In vtro and in vivo experiments revealed that Caulis Polygoni Multiflori (CPM) significantly induced megakaryocyte (MK) differentiation and maturation. To investigate the underlying mechanism of action of CPM in promoting MK differentiation, RNA-seq was performed to reveal the gene expression profile in MK differentiation induced by CPM. Our results showed that CPM up-regulated 850 differentially expressed genes (DEGs), down-regulated 1100 DEGs. Disease Ontology (DO) enrichment analysis revealed that CPM could regulate thrombocytopenia, blood platelet disease and blood coagulation disease. Gene Ontology (GO), Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) and Reactome pathway enrichment analysis suggested that CPM regulated PI3K/Akt and ERK/MEK (MAPK) signaling pathways. Comparative gene expression profiling analysis of RNA-seq data for K562 cells treated with CPM (80 µg/mL) for 3 days and without CPM.