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Objective: Diabetes mellitus is a metabolic disease due to failure in insulin secretion function. Kidney is a target organ in diabetes. Diabetic nephropathy is a major cause of end stage renal disease and resulting in increased morbidity and mortality of affected individuals. Since diabetes is a progressive disease, early diagnosis serves better treatment. Methods: We induced diabetes in rat by alloxan administration after 8 weeks. We detected lipofuscin products with H&E, PAS and schmorl’s staining methods. Findings: Diabetic rats showed increasing lipofuscin in renal proximal tubular cells. Conclusion: Increased lipofuscin pigments is a good indicator for diagnosis of diabetes in rats.

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BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Considering that mellitus diabetes has adverse effects on spermatogenesis and male fertility and given the easy and safe access to herbal medicines to treat diabetes complications, this study investigated the preventive and therapeutic effects of ziziphora clinopodioides lam on testicular damage in male rats.
METHODS: In this experimental study, 32 male Wistar rats weighing 200 to 220 g were divided into four groups of eight. The control group, the group that became diabetic through intraperitoneal injection of 55 mg/kg  streptozotocin, experimental group 1 (diabetic+100 mg/kg ziziphora clinopodioides lam by gavage) and experimental group 2 (diabetic +100 mg/kg ziziphora clinopodioides lam by gavage) that became diabetic after two months, and received ziziphora clinopodioides lam extract by gavage for five weeks. Blood samples were collected at the beginning of the fifth week, and the testes were examined macroscopically (right testis) (length, volume, weight and diameter of testes) and histologically (left testis) (spermatogenesis count).
FINDINGS: In the diabetic group, there was a significant decrease in spermatogonial cells (58.22±6.11) compared with control (78.18±10.20) (p<0.001) and significant decrease was observed in sertoli cells in diabetic group (5.55±0.87), compared to the control group (17.33±1.57) (p<0.001). In addition, a significant increase was observed in spermatid cells in the experimental group 2 (114.83±4.80) compared with the experimental group 1 (100.33±3.38) (p<0.001).
CONCLUSION: The results of the study showed that long-term administration of ziziphora clinopodioides lam is effective in the diameter and thickness of the spermatic ducts. Therefore, treatment with ziziphora clinopodioides lam can improve the spermatogenesis of diabetic men.