Figure 1.
Exendin-4 decreases (V)LDL and slightly increases HDL. After 5 weeks of feeding a Western-type diet containing 0.4% cholesterol, mice were treated with exendin-4 (50 μg·kg−1·day−1) or vehicle (PBS) s.c. for 4 weeks. Blood was collected by tail bleeding after 4 h of fasting before treatment (T = 0), and after 2 (T = 2) and 4 (T = 4) weeks of treatment. Plasma cholesterol (A) and TG (B) levels were determined. After 4 weeks of treatment, group-wise pooled plasma was fractionated using fast protein liquid chromatography on a Superose 6 column, and the individual fractions were assayed for cholesterol (C). Livers were isolated, mRNA was extracted and Apoa1 mRNA was determined as normalized to cyclophilin and hypoxanthine ribosyltransferase mRNA levels. Data were calculated as fold difference compared with vehicle (D). Values are means ± SEM (n = 17 mice per group). *P < 0.05 compared with vehicle.