Chickpea has high nutritional value and various physiological functions. It is a high-quality raw material for developing functional food, suitable for diabetic diet. The aim of this work was to investigate the effects of Lactobacillus fermented chickpea milk on the diabetes symptoms and intestinal flora in mice. The results showed that compared with the diabetes mice group (DM), the blood glucose in the fermented chickpea milk group (FCM) decreased by 41.29%. Additionally, the fermented chickpea milk also mitigated body weight loss in diabetic mice. The liver and kidney damage of diabetic mice was also improved. The lipid metabolism indexes, and serum inflammatory factors of diabetic mice were effectively regulated by the fermented chickpea milk. Specifically, the low-density lipoprotein cholesterol level was reduced by 21.49% compared to the DM group. In addition, fermented chickpea milk could regulate the ratio of Firmicutes to Bacteroides in the intestinal flora of diabetic mice, reduce the abundance of Proteobacteria pathogenic bacteria, and increase the abundance of beneficial bacteria such as Akkermansia , Bacteroides , Faecalibaculum , and Akkermansia mucinophila . All these microbiota changes were beneficial to alleviate the symptoms of diabetes in mice. These findings would provide theoretical basis for developing functional plant-based fermented food with hypoglycemic effect.
Meng et al. (Wed,) studied this question.