Anti-Obesity Effect of Nostoc commune Ethanol Extract In Vitro and In Vivo.

Sheng-Chieh Tsai,Shu-Ling Hsieh,Chiu-Wen Chen,Jyh-Jye Wang,Yu-Wen Huang,Chih-Chung Wu,Cheng-Di Dong,Ya-Ting Chen,Reeta Rani Singhania

doi:10.3390/nu14050968

Abstract

Nostoc commune is an edible terrestrial blue-green alga. It has shown many beneficial effects on human health. This study aimed to investigate the phytochemical assay of N. commune ethanol extract (NEE) and its anti-obesity effects. The effect of a high-calorie diet on lipid accumulation in 3T3-L1 preadipocytes is investigated, and a Wistar rat model is used to demonstrate the anti-obesity effect of NEE and its mechanism. The results showed that the NEE has phytochemical compounds, such as total polyphenol, total flavonoids, and total terpenoids. NEE was also shown to suppress cell proliferation and lipid accumulation (26.9%) in 3T3-L1 preadipocytes. Furthermore, NEE reduced the body weight (13.5%), fat tissue weight (13.3%), and the serum FFA (19.4%), TG (14.2%), TC (11.8%), and LDL-C (16.4%) of rats. In histopathology, NEE was shown to diminish the size of adipocytes and hepatic lipid droplets. The NEE downregulated the mRNA expression of adipogenesis (PPAR-γ, SREBP-1c) and lipid lysis-related genes (ATGL, HSL) in epididymal adipose tissue. The NEE also upregulated the mRNA expression of β-oxidation related genes (AMPK, CPT-1, PPAR-α) in the liver. Overall, this study suggests NEE has the potential to be developed as a functional food for anti-obesity.

Highlights

Obesity is defined as an excess of fatty tissue in the body, which increases the risk of a variety of chronic illnesses and body function disorders, such as diabetes mellitus type 2, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, and obese sarcopenia. [1,2]
We investigated the effect of N. commune ethanol extract (NEE) on cell proliferation and lipid accumulation in 3T3-L1 preadipocytes
We did not find toxic characteristics in treatment with high doses of NEE. These findings show that phytochemicals in NEE from N. commune may be responsible for its anti-obesity effect in obese rats fed with a high calorie diet

Summary

Introduction

Obesity is defined as an excess of fatty tissue in the body, which increases the risk of a variety of chronic illnesses and body function disorders, such as diabetes mellitus type 2, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, and obese sarcopenia. [1,2]. Lipogenesis and lipolysis are important processes for the control of adipocyte energy balance. Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPARγ) is one of the transcription factors that is important in the transformation of preadipocytes into mature adipocytes; sterol regulatory element-binding protein (SREBP) expression helps triglyceride synthesis in adipocytes, which leads to adipocyte lipid accumulation [4,5]. Hormone-sensitive lipase (HSL) and adipose triglyceride lipase (ATGL) promote lipolysis and lyse triglyceride into monoglyceride and free fatty acid in adipocyte lipid droplets, with an increase of up to 95%, and are the key factors of lipolysis. Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor α (PPAR-α), present in adipocyte, hepatocyte, muscle, and epithelial cells, acts in controlling lipid and glucose homeostasis [11–13]. Its activation increases mitochondria β-oxidation-promoting fatty acid catabolism, which results in lipid content reduction. Carnitine palmitoyltransferase I (CPT-1) inhibits malonyl-CoA to reduce lipogenesis, controlling the β-oxidation process of long-chain fatty acid into mitochondria [14,15]. Many studies on anti-obesity using seaweed extract or seaweed derivatives for cell or animal models have been conducted, but rarely for terrestrial algae

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