The effect of Quercus brantii fruit methanolic extract on mean volume and total number of Leydig cells in type II diabetic rats

Background: Fruit of Iranian oak (Quercus brantii) possess many fatty acid and pleiotropic therapeutic activities that is used widely in Iranian traditional folkloric medicine. Our previous study showed that Q. brantii had a hypoglycemic effect in diabetic rats but there is no data about effects of Q. brantii fruit on Leydig cells in diabetic males.Methods: Twenty adult male wistar rats were divided into 4 groups including: control, sham, diabetic and treatment. Type II diabetes was induced by high fat diet and 35 mg/kg streptozotocin in diabetic and treatment groups. One week after streptozotocin injection, sham and treatment groups received 100 mg/kg/day total methanolic extract of Q. brantii by oral gavage for 40 consecutive days. Finally, animals were euthanized and testes were fixed in 10% neutral buffered formalin. The samples were processed by standard paraffin embedding and serially sectioned at 20 µm thickness. Twenty to twenty-five sections per animal were selected through systematic random sampling and stained by H&E. Mean volume of Leydig cells (MV) was estimated by point sampled intercept method and its total numbers (TN) were estimated by optical dissector and stereo-investigator system using an unbiased counting frame.Result: Results showed that administration of Q. brantii had no effect on MV and TN in normal rats. Diabetes decreased MV and TN significantly (p0.05).Conclusion: It can be concluded that Q. brantii can be considered as a suitable protective strategy for improvement of diabetes side effect in testis and can have a supportive effect on Leydig cells and increase fertilization ability in the diabetic males.

کلیدواژه ها:

Diabetes ، Leydig cell ، Quercus brantii ، Stereology ، Streptozocin ، Iranian oak