Hypoglycemic effect of two cultivates varieties of Cucurbita moschata Duch.

To evaluate the hypoglycemic effect of extracts from two cultivate varieties of Cucurbita moschata Duch. (Jingou and Tianmian) .Diabetes model mice were established through the tail vein injection of alloxan.The levels of fasting plasma glucose, postprandial blood glucose, malondialdehyde (MDA) , superoxide dismutase (SOD) , total cholesterol (TC) and triglyceride (TG) in mice serum, liver glycogen in liver homogenate were detected to evaluate the protective effects of ethyl acetate extract and methanol extract from C.moschata on diabetes induced by alloxan in mice.Ethyl acetate extract and methanol extract from two varieties of C.moschata could significantly decrease fasting plasma glucose (p < 0.01 and p < 0.05, respectively) , but the effect to postprandial blood glucose was not obvious.All of the extract could obviously improve liver glycogen in liver (p < 0.001, p < 0.01 and p < 0.05, respectively) , significantly increase the level of SOD in mice serum and reduce the level of MDA.But the extracts had no function to TC and TG of diabetes model mice.The result demonstrated that two varieties of C.moschata had protective effects on diabetes model mice, but the extract showed different effect.