Xylitol attenuates diabetes induced intestinal permeability changes and inflammatory injury by improving intestinal tight junction protein expression and mucus secretion in rats

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study was to investigate the protective effect of xylitol on gut mucosal barrier injury in a type 2 diabetes rat model. Treatment with xylitol not only ameliorated diabetic-induced changes to small intestinal mucosa morphology and decreased diamine oxidase concentration in the serum of diabetic rats, but also modified the inflammatory infiltrates and improved the secretory IgA levels of the small intestinal epithelium. Increased expression of zo-1, occludin, mucin-2 and intestinal trefoil factor also was detected in small intestinal tissue. Intragastric administration of xylitol suppressed diabetes-induced increases of myeloperoxidase, eosinophil peroxidase, IL-6 and TNF-α. These results suggest that xylitol reduces mucosal inflammatory lesions and improves the intestinal barrier in diabetic rats by maintaining the structural integrity of the mucous layer, inhibiting the expression of inflammatory mediators and enhancing the expression of tight junction proteins associated with intestinal permeability.

KEYWORDS:

• Xylitol
• type 2 diabetes
• intestinal permeability
• inflammatory injury
• mucus
• tight junction protein

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant number LY22C200013; Special Fund for Business Expenses of Colleges and Universities in Zhejiang Province under Grant number XRK21005, and Food Safety Key Laboratory of Zhejiang Province, Ministry of Education, P. R. China, and the enterprise cooperation project with Zhejiang Huakang Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd (Kaihua, China).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics approval

This study was approved by the Committee on the Ethics of Animal Experiments of Zhejiang Gongshang University (Permit Number: ZJGU 20,210,007).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China Natural Science Foundation of Zhejiang Province [LY22C200013]; Special Fund for Business Expenses of Colleges and Universities in Zhejiang Province [XRK21005]; Food Safety Key Laboratory of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Gongshang University, China.