Effect of food azo-dye tartrazine on physiological functions of pancreas and glucose homeostasis

Abstract

Background: Food industry is extensively using tartrazine however, influence of tartrazine-exposure on pancreas remains to be elucidated. Materials and methods: This study was designed to evaluate the effect of tartrazine on pancreas and glucose homeostasis in rats. Albino rats were divided into three groups. Group I was control, group II and III were assigned as low and high doses of tartrazine-exposed groups respectively. Blood samples were collected to estimate the glucose homeostasis and insulin, amylase and lipase activity, and glucose tolerance along with morphology of pancreas. Results: The results showed that tartrazine at higher doses, increased blood sugar (230.830 ± 0.940 mg/dL) and insulin (0.395 ± 0.012 ng/mL) levels as compared to that of control. HOMA-IR value of tartrazine-exposed rats was significantly high (1.450 ± 0.090) as compared to that of control. Moreover, the serum levels of amylase and lipase were also increased significantly in tartrazine-exposed rats. Correspondingly, morphology of pancreas was also found to be changed in tartrazine-exposed rats. Conclusion: These results demonstrated that tartrazine has a critical influence on glucose homeostasis. This evidently reveals that tartrazine has damaging effects on pancreas and enduring the exposure of tartrazine could possibly result in the disturbance of normal endocrine functioning of pancreas.