A study by researchers from the Institut d’Investigació Biomèdica de Sant Pau (IIB Sant Pau) and the CIBER of Diabetes and Associated Metabolic Diseases (CIBERDEM) demonstrates the key role of the liver lipase enzyme in the accumulation of liver lipids and the development of adiposity.
The work has been published in the prestigious scientific journal Plos One.
Researchers from the CIBER of Diabetes and associated Metabolic Diseases (CIBERDEM) and the Institut d’Investigació Biomèdica de Sant Pau (IIB Sant Pau), have identified the mechanisms by which the enzyme hepatic lipase, associated with the presence of metabolic alterations, obesity and the development of hepatic steatosis (fatty liver), causes accumulation of hepatic lipids and the development of adiposity.
The team of researchers, led by doctors Juan Carlos Escolà-Gil and Francisco Blanco-Vaca (IIB Sant Pau /CIBERDEM), used a transgenic mouse model that expressed human liver lipase in the liver. They demonstrated that enzyme expression promotes in vivo liver lipogenesis through the induction of a transcription factor (Srebf1) that controls the expression of major genes involved in fatty acid biosynthesis.
Lídia Cedó, researcher at CIBERDEM at the IIB Sant Pau and first signatory of the work, explains that “this study has been able to demonstrate the key role of liver lipase in the regulation of liver metabolism of lipids and fatty tissue accumulation “.
The researchers also found that the expression of this enzyme increased the ability of fat tissue cells to hydrolyze triglycerides by another enzyme (lipoprotein lipase) and the accumulation of fatty acids.
Vicenta Llorente-Cortes, researcher at the CIBERCV/CSIC-ICCC and Juan Carlos Laguna and Nuria Roglans from the Faculty of Pharmacy of the University of Barcelona, among others, have also participated in the study, published in Plos One.
Reference article:
Cedó L, Santos D, Roglans N, Julve J, Pallarès V, Rivas-Urbina A, et al. (2017) Human hepatic lipase overexpression in mice induces hepatic steatosis and obesity through promoting hepatic lipogenesis and white adipose tissue lipolysis and fatty acid uptake. PLoS ONE 12(12):e0189834.
