Protective Effects of Ethanolic Extracts from Artichoke, an Edible Herbal Medicine, against Acute Alcohol-Induced Liver Injury in Mice
1
College of Chemical Engineering, Huaqiao University, Xiamen 361021, China
2
College of Life and Environmental Science, Hunan University of Arts and Science, Changde 415000, China
3
College of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Huaqiao University, Xiamen 361021, China
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Nutrients 2017, 9(9), 1000; https://doi.org/10.3390/nu9091000
Received: 7 August 2017 / Revised: 3 September 2017 / Accepted: 6 September 2017 / Published: 11 September 2017
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nutrition and Liver Disease)
Oxidative stress and inflammation are well-documented pathological factors in alcoholic liver disease (ALD). Artichoke (Cynara scolymus L.) is a healthy food and folk medicine with anti-oxidative and anti-inflammatory properties. This study aimed to evaluate the preventive effects of ethanolic extract from artichoke against acute alcohol-induced liver injury in mice. Male Institute of Cancer Research mice were treated with an ethanolic extract of artichoke (0.4, 0.8, and 1.6 g/kg body weight) by gavage once daily. Up to 40% alcohol (12 mL/kg body weight) was administered orally 1 h after artichoke treatment. All mice were fed for 10 consecutive days. Results showed that artichoke extract significantly prevented elevated levels of aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, triglyceride, total cholesterol, and malondialdehyde. Meanwhile, the decreased levels of superoxide dismutase and glutathione were elevated by artichoke administration. Histopathological examination showed that artichoke attenuated degeneration, inflammatory infiltration and necrosis of hepatocytes. Immunohistochemical analysis revealed that expression levels of toll-like receptor (TLR) 4 and nuclear factor-kappa B (NF-κB) in liver tissues were significantly suppressed by artichoke treatment. Results obtained demonstrated that artichoke extract exhibited significant preventive protective effect against acute alcohol-induced liver injury. This finding is mainly attributed to its ability to attenuate oxidative stress and suppress the TLR4/NF-κB inflammatory pathway. To the best of our knowledge, the underlying mechanisms of artichoke on acute ALD have been rarely reported.
View Full-Text
Keywords:
artichoke; acute alcohol liver disease; oxidative stress; inflammation; TLR4/NF-κB pathway
▼
Show Figures
Figure 1
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited
MDPI and ACS Style
Tang, X.; Wei, R.; Deng, A.; Lei, T. Protective Effects of Ethanolic Extracts from Artichoke, an Edible Herbal Medicine, against Acute Alcohol-Induced Liver Injury in Mice. Nutrients 2017, 9, 1000.
Show more citation formats
Note that from the first issue of 2016, MDPI journals use article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.
