Context: Diabetes mellitus (DM), a chronic disease, has been increasing and subsequently devastates the quality of life and economic status of the patients. Oxidative stress participates in development and progression of diabetes, in which levels of glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) were changed in diabetic mice. Berberine has been widely used as an alternative medicine and proved to be effective for treatment of DM and dyslipidemia.
Objective: Impacts of berberine on regulation of GPx and SOD messenger RNAs (mRNAs), and glutathione (GSH) content were examined in diabetic mice to clarify its antioxidative stress potential.
Materials and methods: Noninsulin-dependent diabetes was induced in mice by a single intraperitoneal streptozotocin injection. Diabetic mice were daily treated with metformin (100 mg/kg/d) or berberine (200 mg/kg/d) for 2 weeks. The fasting blood glucose and GSH content were monitored. GPx and SOD mRNA expression were semi-quantified by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction.
Results: Berberine showed the same hypoglycemic potential as metformin, a hypoglycemic drug. Interestingly, berberine did not change levels of GPx, copper-zinc SOD (CuZn-SOD), and manganese SOD (Mn-SOD) mRNA in the normal mice but significantly recovered these levels in the diabetic mice to nearly the same levels as the normal. The GSH contents, including total GSH and reduced/oxidized GSH contents, were restored to the normal level by berberine, corresponded to GPx levels.
Discussion and conclusion: Berberine conveyed antioxidative effect via down- and up-regulation of GPx and CuZn-SOD expression, respectively. Therefore, use of berberine as a hypoglycemic compound for alternative treatment of DM could bring extra-beneficent consequence according to its antioxidative stress.