High-fat diet leads to same intestinal inflammation as a virus

FINDINGSA new study by scientists at UCLA found that when mice eat a high-fat diet, the cells in their small intestines respond the same way they do to a viral infection, turning up production of certain immune molecules and causing inflammation throughout the body. The scientists also found that feeding the mice tomatoes containing a protein similar to that in HDL, or “good cholesterol,” along with the generic cholesterol drug Ezetimibe, reversed the inflammation.The results could lead to new types of drugs, targeting the intestinal cells, to reduce people ’s risk of heart attacks and strokes, or to treat other conditions linked to inflammation, including cancer and inflammatory bowel disease.BACKGROUNDResearchers already knew that prolonged obesity can cause inflammation of the liver and fat tissues, and that this inflammation contributes to the development of diabetes and heart disease. Studies have also shown that higher levels of high-density lipoprotein, or HDL, cholesterol, reduces a person ’s risk of heart disease.The UCLA research team, led by Alan Fogelman, chair of the department of medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA,  previously developed genetically engineered tomatoes that contained 6F, a protein resembling the main protein in high-density lipoprotein. In early experiments on 6F, they found that the compound was active in the small intestines of mice, and that it reduced inflammation. But exactly how it did this was unclear.METHODTh...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news