Protective effects of polysaccharides from Lilium lancifolium on streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice

•LLP can decrease blood glucose level of STZ-induced diabetic mice.•LLP can decrease lipid peroxidation level of STZ-induced diabetic mice.•LLP can increase antioxidant enzyme activity in serum and tissues of diabetic mice.•LLP can restore pancreatic islet structure integrity of STZ-induced diabetic mice.

In this study, the protective effect of Lilium lancifolium polysaccharides (LLP) on streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic mice and possible mechanism were investigated. The diabetic mice were administered with LLP for 28 days. The results showed that oral administration of LLP could significantly decrease blood glucose level and increase body weight loss in STZ-induced diabetic mice. LLP also significantly increased the activities of antioxidant enzymes superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and catalase (CAT) and decreased the level of malondialdehyde (MDA) in serum, liver, and kidney in STZ-induced diabetic mice. Moreover, histopathological examination showed that LLP could markedly improve the structure integrity of pancreatic islet tissue in STZ-induced diabetic mice. However, LLP had no significant effect on organ weight of liver and pancreas of diabetic mice, but significantly decreased kidney weight compared with diabetic control mice. This study suggested that LLP had hypoglycemic and antioxidant properties and could provide protective effect on STZ-induced diabetic mice.