Evaluation of the effect of thymol on Pax4 gene expression in Streptozotocin-induced diabetic rats

The PAX4 gene encodes crucial transcription factors for cellular differentiation and development. PAX4 is essential for the production of pancreatic islet cell ancestors and their differentiation into beta cells. Proper function of this gene is essential not only in development but also in the survival and repair of beta cells, and mutations in it are associated with type 1 and type 2 diabetes. The present study was designed to investigate the effect of thymol on PAX4 gene expression in streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice.

In this study, 42 adult Wistar rats were randomly divided into 7 groups of six. Group A: healthy control group, group B: receive 160 mg/kg thymol by gavage every three days once a month, group C: streptozotocin-diabetic, and negative control group (diabetic control), Group D: Glycemic drug (metformin) 80 mg/kg gavage, group E, G and F are treatment group that gavage 40, 80 and 160 mg/kg, respectively they receive. Real time - PCR technique was used to evaluate the expression of PAX4 gene. Data analysis was performed using SPSS V.22 software and ANOVA was used for statistical comparison of samples.

The present study showed that the expression of PAX4 gene in diabetic rats treated with different Thymol doses had a significant difference compared to the diabetic control group (P-value < 0.001). In this case, the use of Thymol has led to an increase in the expression of PAX4 gene in pancreatic beta cells in diabetic rats, which was a dose-dependent increase of expression.

Thymol can be considered to improve disease in patients with diabetes mellitus by increasing PAX4 expression and decreasing blood glucose concentration.