Supplementation with apple enriched with L‐arginine may improve metabolic control and survival rate in alloxan‐induced diabetic rats

Abstract

Supplementation with L-arginine or fresh food with high content of this amino acid is associated with favorable effects in the metabolic control of diabetes. We aimed to determine whether supplementation with apples enriched with L-arginine offer additional benefits compared to L-arginine by itself in a preclinical study of diabetes. This study combines food-engineer technologies with in vivo and in vitro analysis. In vitro experiments show that cells derived from non-diabetic animals and exposed to high glucose (25 mM, 12 H) and cells isolated from alloxan-induced diabetic animals exhibited a reduction (∼50%) in the L-arginine uptake. This effect was reverted by L-arginine pretreatment (12 H) in both the normal and diabetes-derived cells. In preclinical studies, normoglycemic (n = 25) and diabetic groups (n = 50) were divided into subgroups that received either L-arginine (375 mg/kg per 10 days) or apple enriched with L-arginine or vehicle (control). In a preliminary analysis, supplementation with L-arginine by itself (50%) or apple enriched with L-arginine (100%) improve survival rate in the diabetic group compared to control (0%) at the end of the follow up (17 days). This phenomenon was associated with a partial but sustained high plasma level of L-arginine, as well as plasma concentration of nitrites and insulin in the L-arginine or apple + L-arginine groups after supplementation. Apple + L-arginine supplementation in diabetic animals induced the highest and longest effects in the level of these three markers among the studied groups. Therefore, apple enriched by L-arginine offers more benefits than L-arginine by itself in this preclinical study.

Extracellular vesicles from preeclampsia disrupt the blood-brain barrier via reduced claudin-5: potential role of vascular endothelial growth factor

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Apple snack enriched with L-arginine using vacuum impregnation/ohmic heating technology

“…Moreover, similar beneficial effects have been described in patients with type 2 diabetes (Lucotti et al., 2006). L-arginine supplementation and specialty foods enriched with this amino acid, such as apples enriched with L-arginine, hold great promise as a safe and cost-effective method for improving the metabolic profiles of diabetics (Escudero et al., 2013).…”