AUTHOR=Zhou Wenlin , Weng Yujie , Liu Qian , Wang Chonglong , Zhang Yu-Qing , Zhang Xing , Ye Aihong 

TITLE=Dietary administration with hydrolyzed silk sericin improves the intestinal health of diabetic rats

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=Volume 14 - 2023

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2023.1074892

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2023.1074892

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=Type II diabetes (T2D) is a global epidemic disease with an increased incidence and prevalence. Gut microbiota plays an important role in controlling T2D development. Dietary administration of prebiotics, probiotics and drugs, including metformin, showed the regulatory impact on change of gut microbiota, which are associated with improvement of glucose tolerance. In this study, silk sericin was manufactured into the hydrolyzed sericin peptide (HSP) powders as a dietary additive to investigate the effect on the gut microbiota of T2D model rats. The results indicated the HSP augmented dietary administration lowers the fast glucose level of diabetic rats, and HSP augmentation induces the change in gut microbiota composition of T2D model rats towards the healthy rats. Some key taxa including Lactobacillus gasseri were suggested to be involved in controlling T2D development. This finding provides a new insight to develop sericin as functional food or therapeutic prebiotics against T2D in clinic practice.