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Arbutin alleviates diabetic symptoms by attenuating oxidative stress in a mouse model of type 1 diabetes

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Abstract

Background

Arbutin is a well-known tyrosinase inhibitor that prevents the formation of melanin through the inhibition of tyrosinase. Therefore, it has been widely used as a cosmetic skin-lightening agent. Arbutin is able to scavenge free radicals within cells and previous studies have found that it also exhibited useful activities for the treatment of diuresis, bacterial infections, and cancer, as well as anti-inflammatory and anti-tussive activities. This study analyzed the effects of arbutin on streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetes mellitus in a murine model.

Methods

Healthy male adult C57BL/6 mice (7 weeks old) were randomly allocated into one of the following three groups of six animals: Normal control with no STZ administration, STZ-induced diabetes, and STZ-induced diabetes treated with 0.3 g/kg/day of arbutin. After 12 days, the levels of insulin, C-peptide, and HbA1c were measured in serum, and the expression and enzymatic activities of superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT), and glutathione peroxidase (GPx) were analyzed in pancreatic tissues by western blotting.

Results

Arbutin was found to significantly inhibit the increase in blood glucose and the loss of body weight in diabetic mice. Arbutin increased plasma insulin levels in mice with STZ-induced diabetes, whereas there was no detection of insulin in untreated diabetic mice. In addition, there was an increased expression and activity of SOD, CAT, and GPx in diabetic mice treated with arbutin.

Conclusions

This investigation demonstrated that arbutin possesses antioxidant activities and can alleviate symptoms of type-1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) in mice.

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Abbreviations

STZ:

streptozotocin

CAT:

catalase

DM:

diabetes mellitus

T1DM:

type-1 diabetes mellitus

SOD:

superoxide dismutase

GPx:

glutathione peroxidase

ROS:

reactive oxygen species

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Funding

This work was funded by the Jiangsu Province Natural Science Foundation (BK20151046) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81603586).

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Author notes

  1. Hui Li and Wen Cao contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Gastroenterology, Affiliated Hospital of Integrated Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, 210028, Jiangsu, China

    Hui Li, Lan-Fu Wei, Jun-Quan Xia, Yi Gu, Li-Mei Gu, Cheng-Yu Pan & Yao-Zhou Tian

  2. Department of Endocrinology, Affiliated Hospital of Integrated Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, 210028, Jiangsu, China

    Wen Cao

  3. Department of Gastroenterology, Nanjing Lishui District Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, 211200, Jiangsu, China

    You-Qian Liu & Min Lu

Authors
  1. Hui Li
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  2. Wen Cao
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  3. Lan-Fu Wei
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  4. Jun-Quan Xia
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  5. Yi Gu
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  7. Cheng-Yu Pan
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  9. Yao-Zhou Tian
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  10. Min Lu
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Yao-Zhou Tian or Min Lu.

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The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Ethnical approval

All animals were maintained and used in accordance with the guidelines of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of the Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, China. All of the experimental procedures were approved by the ethics committee of the Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine.

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Li, H., Cao, W., Wei, LF. et al. Arbutin alleviates diabetic symptoms by attenuating oxidative stress in a mouse model of type 1 diabetes. Int J Diabetes Dev Ctries 41, 586–592 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13410-021-00920-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13410-021-00920-0

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