Mechanism of high-fat diet-induced non-alcoholic fatty liver disease

Abstract

Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is gradually becoming one of the most frequent causes of liver diseases. The aim of this study was to establish a mouse model of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease induced by high fat diet, which could be used for studying the pathogenesis of NAFLD. Forty male C57BL/6J mice were randomly divided into normal and high-fat model groups. Compared with the normal group, after 5 weeks of high-fat diet, the model group showed significantly elevated serum TG, TC, fasting glucose, transaminase, hepatic TG, TC and TNF-α levels (P <0.05). In contrast, hepatic adiponectin content was significantly reduced (P <0.05) in the model group compared to the normal group. The morphological alterations determined by HE and Sudan III further showed diffuse hepatic steatosis and massive inflammatory cell infiltration in the model group. Immunohistochemistry staining further revealed significantly elevated CYP2E1 and TGF-β1 expression and markedly decreased catalase and adiponectin expression in the model group compared to the control group (P <0.05). This study confirmed that high-fat diet significantly increased liver CYP2E1 and TGF-β1 expressions and decreased adiponectin and catalase expressions in NAFLD mouse model.