Chapter 40 - Experimental Models of Liver Damage Mediated by Oxidative Stress

Abstract

Oxidative stress plays a causative role in many human diseases; hence, animal (usually rodents) models that involve free radicals are very important to emulate the disease in humans and to evaluate new therapies. The most common experimental models to study liver diseases are carbon tetrachloride, which induces acute or chronic liver injury that shares several characteristics with human alcoholic cirrhosis; prolonged bile duct ligation that induces a secondary biliary cirrhosis; ischemia/reperfusion injury that mimics the alterations frequently observed in liver preservation before transplanting the organ; experimental amebic abscess, useful to explore the pathophysiology of parasitic infections; concanavalin A administration produces a similar condition to autoimmune hepatitis; chronic administration of dimethyl or diethyl nitrosamine produces necrosis, fibrosis, and cancer. There are also several dietary models that produce steatohepatitis, necrosis, and fibrosis. The models described herein involve reactive oxygen/nitrogen species and are essential in the area of experimental hepatology.