Dietary food additive monosodium glutamate with or without high-lipid diet induces spleen anomaly: A mechanistic approach on rat model.

Debasmita Das,Bithin Kumar Maji,Arnab Banerjee,Sandip Mukherjee,Ankita Bhattacharjee

doi:10.1515/biol-2022-0004

Abstract

Globally, the trend of using food additives and eating ready-made fast food has led to a deleterious impact on immune organs. Monosodium glutamate (MSG), as a food additive in a high-lipid diet (HLD), acts as a silent killer of immune cells. Hence, the present study aimed to evaluate the role of MSG in HLD on spleen injury in rats. Results showed that a 2.52-fold and 1.91-fold increase in spleen index in MSG and MSG + HLD group indicates splenomegaly, whereas a 1.36-fold and 1.29-fold increase in pro-inflammatory cytokines in MSG and MSG + HLD-fed rats, respectively, promote the inflammatory response. Additionally, MSG and MSG + HLD induce oxidative stress by 1.81-fold and 1.1-fold increased generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in macrophage population, and 1.38-fold and 1.36-fold increased generation of ROS in lymphocytes population, respectively. Furthermore, mitochondrial membrane potential was significantly reduced by 1.43-fold and 1.18-fold in MSG and MSG + HLD groups. Therefore, the current study argues that MSG has more detrimental effects on the spleen than MSG + HLD due to the presence of antioxidants in HLD, which suppresses the deleterious impact of MSG. Hence, it can be inferred that MSG induces spleen injury via targeting redox-guided cellular signaling with inflammatory response, leading to severe immune system anomalies.

Highlights

Eating habits are rapidly changing worldwide, and a dependency on ready-made fast food with minimal physical activity leads to health problems [1,2]
Higher (a 1.91-fold increase in monosodium glutamate (MSG) + high-lipid diet (HLD) group and a 2.52-fold increase in MSG group) spleen index (Figure 1c) in MSG + HLD and MSG-fed rats (Control vs MSG + HLD: P < 0.05; Control vs MSG: P < 0.01; and MSG + HLD vs MSG: P < 0.05) indicates severe infection in the spleen tissue which well corroborated with pro-inflammatory marker and oxidative stress-related parameters in the later section of the study
It can be inferred that MSG with or without HLD causes splenomegaly, but the detrimental impact was higher in the MSG-fed group alone compared to the rest of the group

Summary

Introduction

Eating habits are rapidly changing worldwide, and a dependency on ready-made fast food with minimal physical activity leads to health problems [1,2]. MSG is suspected of increasing the generation of free radicals in the body, which leads to a decrease in the body’s antioxidant production. This results in oxidative damage throughout the body [1,2,4]. The adverse effects of obesity include impaired immune function, which is reflected in an inflammatory response that is not resolved, and impaired immune surveillance [10]

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