Abstract
Our previous in vivo studies with guinea pigs, cats and rats showed that changes in the hepatocellular levels of taurine affect the liver lipid composition of these animal species (6,7,30). Specifically, we found that a taurine-supplemented diet lowered the liver concentrations of phospholipid, but had contrasting effects on neutral lipid content. Taurine supplementation increased the liver stores of triglyceride in guinea pigs and cats (species with a low endogenous synthesis of taurine), but depleted these liver stores in rats (species with an active endogenous synthesis of taurine). The changes were not only quantitative but also qualitative. Taurine supplement (but also its depletion) induced significant changes in the cholesterol proportion, in the ratio of phosphatidylethanolamine to phosphatidylcholine and in the fatty acid profile of the major phospholipid classes. The good agreement between our data and previous in vivo (4,18,29) and in vitro (25) studies, indicated that taurine has an important role not only in biliary lipid secretion, but also in liver lipid metabolism.
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Cantafora, A., Yan, C.C., Sun, Y., Masella, R. (1994). Effects of Taurine on Microsomal Enzyme Activities Involved in Liver Lipid Metabolism of Wistar Rats. In: Huxtable, R.J., Michalk, D. (eds) Taurine in Health and Disease. Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology, vol 359. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-1471-2_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-1471-2_11
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