Oleanolic acid and moderate drinking increase the pancreatic GLP-1R expression of the β -cell mass deficiency induced hyperglycemia.

Background: Oleanolic acid (OA) and moderate drinking have been reported to attenuate diabetes. However, the underlying mechanism of OA and moderate drinking alone or in combination on the islet β -cell deficiency induced diabetes is not fully elucidated.
Methods: Male Sprague Dawley (SD) rats were intraperitoneally injected with 55 mg/kg streptozotocin (STZ) to induce β -cell deficiency. OA, 5% ethanol (EtOH), or a mixture of OA in 5% ethanol (OA+EtOH) were applied to three treatment groups of hyperglycemia rats for 6 weeks.
Results: STZ caused the increase of fast blood glucose (FBG) level.OA and EtOH treatment alone or in combination decreased the STZ increased FBG level during the 6 weeks of treatment. In addition, OA treatment also significantly increased the β -cell to total islet cell ratio. Both EtOH and OA+EtOH treatments promoted the increase of total islet cell number and α -cell to β -cell ratio when compared to OA group. STZ induced hyperglycemia dramatically reduced the glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor (GLP-1R) positive cells in islets, all the three treatments significantly increased the pancreatic GLP-1R positive cell number. In the meantime, STZ induced hyperglycemia suppressed the insulin mRNA expression and boosted the glucagon mRNA expression. EtOH and OA+EtOH treatments increased the insulin mRNA expression, but none of the 3 treatments altered the elevated glucagon level.
Conclusion: GLP-1R positive cell ratio in islets is crucial for the blood glucose level of diabetes. OA and 5% ethanol alone or in combination suppresses the blood glucose level of β -cell deficiency induced diabetes by increasing islet GLP-1R expression.
Competing Interests: The authors declare there are no competing interests.
(©2023 Xu et al.)