Short-chain fatty acids and diabetic cognitive impairment
Diabetes mellitus and its consequences have gained increased attention with the incidence rate rising.Diabetic cognitive impairment(DCI),a neurological consequence of diabetes mellitus,has shown a significant increase in recent years,and its related mechanisms need to be elucidated.Short-chain fatty acids(SCFAs),which are metabolites of dietary fiber fermented by gut microbiota and play a significant role in the"microbial-gut-brain axis",have become a popular research topic in recent years for their link to dia-betes mellitus and brain function.Therefore,it is important to explore the relationship between SCFAs and DCI.This review summarized the changing characteristics of SCFAs in diabetes mellitus,cognitive impair-ment and DCI populations,as well as the mechanisms of SCFAs in DCI,which include glucose-lipid metabo-lism,pathological protein aggregation,inflammation,and mitochondrial autophagy.Future studies should ad-dress the common pathophysiological mechanisms of diabetes mellitus and cognitive impairment,in order to explore the effects of different types and doses of SCFAs in DCI and the underlying mechanisms,so as to pro-vide a theoretical basis for the prevention and treatment of the disease in the context of the"co-morbidity model".