Chickpea extract ameliorates metabolic syndrome symptoms via restoring intestinal ecology and metabolic profile in type 2 diabetic rats

Scope Chickpeas have been recognized as a natural Uyghur medicine in Xinjiang (China) for 2500 years. Although the phenotypic effect on obesity or diabetes was authenticated, the mechanism was unclear. This work aimed to study the effect of chickpea extract (CE) on metabolic syndrome induced by type 2 diabetes and to reveal its related mechanisms, focusing on intestinal flora and metabolomics. Methods and results Diabetic rats were induced by a high-fat diet and intraperitoneal injection of streptozotocin. CE supplementation (10 g/kg) for 4 weeks improved the hyperglycaemia, inflammatory state, and organ functions of diabetic rats. The metabolic profile trajectories of urine and faeces obtained by NMR had good separations among all groups, and CE significantly increased the contents of SCFAs in the cecum. Moreover, CE relieved intestinal dysbiosis by increasing the abundance of SCFAs-producing bacteria (e.g., Enterococcaceae) but reducing conditional pathogenic bacteria (e.g., Corynebacterium). PICRUSt predicted the functions of gut microbiome from the 16S rRNA gene sequences and metagenome, and found that CE restored amino acids degradation, bile acids metabolism and carbohydrate metabolism. Conclusion This study elucidated the role of CE from the perspective of metabolomics and the microbiota, which provided evidence for chickpea as a prebiotic to prevent diabetes. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.