Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic systemic autoimmune disease characterized by inflammatory cell infiltration, which can lead to chronic disability, joint destruction and loss of function. At present, the pathogenesis of RA is still unclear. The purpose of this study is to explore the potential biomarkers and immune molecular mechanisms of rheumatoid arthritis through machine learning-assisted bioinformatics analysis, in order to provide reference for the early diagnosis and treatment of RA disease. RA gene chips were screened from the public gene GEO database, and batch correction of different groups of RA gene chips was performed using Strawberry Perl. DEGs were obtained using the limma package of R software, and functional enrichment analysis such as gene ontology (GO), Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG), disease ontology (DO), and gene set (GSEA) were performed. Three machine learning methods, least absolute shrinkage and selection operator regression (LASSO), support vector machine recursive feature elimination (SVM-RFE) and random forest tree (Random Forest), were used to identify potential biomarkers of RA. The validation group data set was used to verify and further confirm its expression and diagnostic value. In addition, CIBERSORT algorithm was used to evaluate the infiltration of immune cells in RA and control samples, and the correlation between confirmed RA diagnostic biomarkers and immune cells was analyzed. Through feature screening, 79 key DEGs were obtained, mainly involving virus response, Parkinson's pathway, dermatitis and cell junction components. A total of 29 hub genes were screened by LASSO regression, 34 hub genes were screened by SVM-RFE, and 39 hub genes were screened by Random Forest. Combined with the three algorithms, a total of 12 hub genes were obtained. Through the expression and diagnostic value verification in the validation group data set, 7 genes that can be used as diagnostic biomarkers for RA were preliminarily confirmed. At the same time, the correlation analysis of immune cells found that γδT cells, CD4⁺ memory activated T cells, activated dendritic cells and other immune cells were positively correlated with multiple RA diagnostic biomarkers, CD4⁺ naive T cells, regulatory T cells and other immune cells were negatively correlated with multiple RA diagnostic biomarkers. The results of novel characteristic gene analysis of RA showed that KYNU, EVI2A, CD52, C1QB, BATF, AIM2 and NDC80 had good diagnostic and clinical value for the diagnosis of RA, and were closely related to immune cells. Therefore, these seven DEGs may become new diagnostic markers and immunotherapy markers for RA.

Plant-derived medicinal materials have significant potential and promising applications in wound healing and skin regeneration. This study aims to develop a plant-based extract hydrogel from Bletilla striata (Thunb.Reichb.f.), specifically a glucosyloxybenzyl 2-isobutylmalates extract (B), and characterize its potential effects on wound healing. We synthesized the hydrogel using carbomer (C), glycerol (G), and triethanolamine (T) as the matrix, incorporating B into the hydrogel base, and evaluated its physical and chemical properties. In vitro tests assessed the biocompatibility of the glucosyloxybenzyl 2-isobutylmalates-carbomer-glycerol-triethanolamine (B-CGT) hydrogel and its effects on cell proliferation, migration, and adhesion. Animal model experiments evaluated its potential to promote wound healing. The results showed that the prepared B-CGT hydrogel possessed a good three-dimensional network structure and stability, demonstrating significant free radical scavenging capacity in antioxidant tests. In cell experiments, the B-CGT hydrogel exhibited no potential cytotoxicity and showed good hemocompatibility and promotion of cell proliferation. Animal experiments indicated that wounds treated with the B-CGT hydrogel healed significantly faster, with improved formation of new epithelial tissue and collagen. This study suggests that the developed B-CGT hydrogel is a promising candidate for wound dressings, with excellent physicochemical properties and controlled drug release capabilities, effectively promoting the wound healing process.

In this study, the chemical substances of Heiguteng Zhuifeng Huoluo Capsule (HZFC) and its potential active ingredients for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) were characterized and analyzed by medicinal chemistry combined with bioinformatics methods. Also, the potential active ingredients of HZFC against RA were verified by lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced macrophage activation model. The results showed that 79 chemical constituents were successfully identified, mainly including phenylpropanoids, flavonoids, and alkaloids. Among them, 13 active components were closely related to the nine core targets (FASN, ALOX5, EGFR, MMP1, CYP2D6, CNR1, AR, MAOA, and FKBP5) of HZFC in the treatment of RA. Molecular docking further proved that 13 active components had strong docking activity with 9 core targets. In the verification experiment of the LPS-induced RAW 264.7 macrophage model, the verified components (magnoflorine, N-feruloyltyramine, canadine, rutin, quercetin-3-O-glucoside, and pseudocolumbamine) all showed a clear inhibitory effect on the secretion of inflammatory factors in model cells. The above research results suggest that 13 components such as stepharanine, rutin, quercetin-3-O-glucoside, corydine methyl ether, canadine, 8-oxoepiberberine, disinomenine, deosinomenine glucoside, tuduranine, magnoflorine, isosinomenine, pseudocolumbamine, and N-feruloyltyramine may be the main active substances of HZFC in the treatment of RA.