Objective: To study the effect of sucrose on glucose and lipid metabolism and the pathological changes in liver and pancreas of diabetic and normal rats.
Methods: 32 Wistar rats and 32 GK rats were randomly divided into W (Wistar), WS (Wistar + 30% sucrose), G (GK) and GS (GK +30% sucrose ) groups. There was 30% sucrose in the drinking water for WS and GS groups and no sucrose in the drinking water for W and G groups. The metabolism of glucose and lipid and the pathological changes of liver and pancreas were observed at the 2nd, 4th, 6th and 10th week of the experiment respectively.
Results: The body weight and serum TG of WS group increased gradually after drinking water with sucrose, while serum Glu and TC were not changed. There were some pathological lesions in the liver and pancreas of WS group, and the occurrence of lesions in pancreas was earlier than that in liver. Besides what discovered in WS group, serum TC of GS group decreased initially and then gradually recovered, while serum Glu decreased initially then gradually increased. In comparison with WS group, the occurrence of pancreas and liver injuries in GS group was earlier and severer than those in WS group.
Conclusion: Sucrose is harmful for GK and Wistar rats, and could induce or exacerbate the disorder of glucose and lipid metabolism, the pathological lesions of liver and pancreas, and showed a time-response relationship.