Fig 7. Curcumin effects on linoleic acid- and leptin-induced the production of reactive oxygen species and cytokines as well as the infiltration of CD4⁺ cells in HFD-fed mice.

(A) After they were treated with linoleic acid ex vivo, liver macrophages from HFD-fed mice showed a higher stimulation index for reactive oxygen species production (*p<0.05 vs. normal chow-fed mice). In vivo curcumin administration of HFD-fed mice (HFD+curcumin) prevented the increase in the stimulation index (*p<0.05 vs. HFD-fed mice). (B) Ex vivo linoleic acid stimulation of hepatocytes from all the experimental groups resulted in similar stimulation indexes for reactive oxygen species production. (C) TNF-α production induced by ex vivo leptin treatment was higher in liver macrophages from HFD-fed mice (*p<0.05 vs. normal chow-fed mice). In vivo curcumin treatment of HFD-fed mice also prevented the increase in TNF- α production (*p<0.05, HFD+curcumin vs. HFD). (D) The percentage of CD4⁺ cells among the non-parenchymal cell populations was higher in HFD-fed mice (*p<0.01 vs. normal chow-fed mice). In vivo curcumin treatment also prevented the increase in CD4⁺ cell recruitment (*p<0.01, HFD+curcumin vs. HFD). The box and whiskers show the non-parametric statistics: the median, lower and upper quartiles and confidence interval around the median. The Kruskal-Wallis test with Dunn’s post-test was performed.