Context: Diabetes is a serious endocrine and metabolic disorder. Food supplements attract people's attention in mitigating health problems from the aspect of gastrointestinal microflora. Maydis stigma (Zea mays subsp. mays L. [Poaceae]), has been used as water decoction for treating diabetes in folk medicine. It has great potential, and feasibly a stable form of Maydis stigma commercial products could be developed to fulfil the health food market.
Objective: To study the effects of Maydis stigma polysaccharide (MSP) on the intestinal microflora in type-2 diabetes (T2D).
Materials and methods: MSP was fractioned from Maydis stigma by distilled water, purified by DEAE-52 Cellulose chromatography and Sephadex G-200 gel column. Streptozotocin (160 mg/kg) was intraperitoneal injected for 3 days to build model. The diabetic mice were randomly divided into five groups together with control group (10 mice in each group). The doses of MSP were 400, 600 and 800 mg/kg, respectively. After 5 weeks of administration, antidiabetic effects and intestinal microflora balance restoring activities were evaluated by denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis.
Results: Blood glucose levels of MSP-treated groups showed extremely significant hypoglycemic effects (p < 0.01), body weight increased showed extremely significant (p < 0.01) differences. Bacteroides, Lactobacillus and Prevotella were dominant organisms in the intestinal tract. The quality and quantity of Lactobacillus and Bacteroides genus increased remarkably with increasing concentration of MSP.
Discussion and conclusion: Experimental results of this study suggest that MSP has the significant potential to be used as a natural agent for treating T2D and restoring the intestinal microflora balance.
Keywords: Antidiabetic effects; denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis; dominant organisms.