Modulation of gut microbiota by cyanidin 3‐glucoside in a mouse model of fatty liver disease

Abstract

Recent studies suggested that the dysbiosis of gut microbiota might be a leading cause of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), and our previous study revealed that Lonicera caerulea L. berry, which is rich in cyanidin 3‐glucoside (C3G), has protective effects against high fat diet (HFD)‐induced fatty liver disease. The present study aimed to investigate the regulatory effect of C3G on gut microbiota in a mouse NAFLD model. C57BL/6N mice (n=4 for each group) were fed a normal diet (Research Diets D12450B), HFD (Research Diets D12492) only, or HFD containing 0.4% of C3G for 3 months based on our pilot test, liver sections were stained by hematoxylin–eosin, serum lipids and transaminases were measured with the automatic biochemical analyzer, and cecal microbiota was characterized by high throughput sequencing of 16S rDNA amplicons. Dietary supplement of C3G decreased fat deposition and improved liver histology in mice. Biomedical analysis indicated that C3G significantly decreased the ratio of low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL‐c) to high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL‐c), the level of triacylglycerol, and levels of transaminases including alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) in the serum of HFD‐fed mice. The analysis of high throughput sequencing data revealed that the relative abundance of Firmicutes was increased by HFD, but decreased by supplementing C3G; in addition, C3G increased the relative abundance of Bacteroidetes at the phylum level. Most notable microorganisms at the genus level were Lactococcus, Romboutsia and Clostridium; in particular, HFD increased the relative abundance of Lactococcus and Romboutsia, but decreased Clostridium, on the contrary, C3G inhibited Lactococcus and Romboutsia, but promoted the growth of Clostridium. These data demonstrated that C3G potentially attenuated HFD‐induced fatty liver disease by modulating gut microbiota especially up‐regulating Clostridium and down‐regulating Lactococcus and Romboutsia.Support or Funding InformationThis work was partially supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 31741115) and Hundred Talents Program of Hunan Province.This abstract is from the Experimental Biology 2019 Meeting. There is no full text article associated with this abstract published in The FASEB Journal.