Network Pharmacology in Drug Discovery: Current Advances, Challenges, and Future Directions Toward Precision Medicine.

Network pharmacology (NP) is an innovative drug discovery method that provides a comprehensive view of drug-body interactions through complex biological networks. Each drug modulates specific network nodes, and understanding these interactions helps predict therapeutic effects and side effects. By integrating diverse data types and advanced computational methods, NP enables more accurate identification of new drug targets, accelerating the development of effective, targeted therapies. It also supports personalized medicine by tailoring treatments to individual biological profiles. This review examines the fundamentals and strategic significance of NP in drug discovery. Network-based approaches unravel complex molecular interactions and discover drug targets with high accuracy. Holistic NP implementation integrates omics datasets and computational tools to deliver actionable insights. The difficulty of screening all drug pairs due to time and cost constraints has driven the development of computational methods to predict side effects efficiently. NP holds transformative potential for precision medicine, promising improved patient outcomes and innovative treatments across many diseases. Conclusively, NP is transforming drug discovery by providing a whole-view approach to drug interactions and enabling effective, personalized therapeutic interventions.