Steatosis recovery after treatment with a balanced sunflower or olive oil-based diet: Involvement of perisinusoidal stellate cells

Figure 1 Light micrographs of representative liver sections from rats of each dietary group stained for fat with OsO₄. A: High-lipidic olive oil; B: normal-lipidic olive oil; C: high-lipidic sunflower oil; D: normal-lipidic sunflower oil. PT: portal triad; CV: central vein. Scale bar, 100 μm.

Figure 2 Collagen quantification in the high fat-induced steatotic liver (HL-O, HL-S) after its treatment with a normal-lipidic diet (NL-O, NL-S). Data are mean±SD of four determinations. HL-O, high-lipidic olive oil; NL-O normal-lipidic olive oil; HL-S, high-lipidic sunflower oil; NL-S normal-lipidic sunflower oil. Significantly greater than in corresponding HL group: ^aP<0.05 vs HL-S, ¹P<0.02 vs NL-O.

Figure 3 Distribution and location of GFAP immunoreactivity. A: GFAP-positive cells were distributed evenly in the lobule; B: GFAP-IR cells with processes circumscribing a hepatic sinusoid; C: GFAP-IR cell showing lipid droplets in its cytoplasm; D: GFAP-IR cell sending processes towards the vascular vessel. HS, hepatic sinusoid. CV, central vein; black arrow, lipid droplets; scale bar A: 100 mm; scale bars B-D: 10 μm.

Figure 4 Light micrographs of representative liver sections from rats of each dietary group immunostained with GFAP antiserum. A: High-lipidic olive oil; B: normal-lipidic olive oil; C: high-lipidic sunflower oil; D: normal-lipidic sunflower oil. Scale bar, 10 μm.

Figure 5 Western blot analysis of GFAP expression. Top panel: densitometric quantification of GFAP in the high-fat-induced steatotic liver (HL-O and HL-S), and after its treatment with a normal-lipidic diet (NL-O, NL-S). Results were average values of four experimental animals in each group. HL-O, high-lipidic olive oil; NL-O, normal-lipidic olive oil; HL-S, high-lipidic sunflower oil; NL-S, normal-lipidic sunflower oil. Bottom panel: representative autoradiography of the corresponding GFAP band. α-Tubulin immunodetection was also included as a protein-loading control. Protein expression is significantly greater than in HL-O group (^bP<0.001).