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. 2018 Jun 7;315(4):G454–G463. doi: 10.1152/ajpgi.00124.2018

Fig. 5.

Fig. 5.

Effect of a marked increase in dietary cholesterol intake on liver weight, concentrations of unesterified and esterified cholesterol, whole liver cholesterol content, and transaminase activities in mice deficient in either Niemann-Pick C1 (NPC1), sterol O-acyltransferase 2 (SOAT2), or both NPC1 and SOAT2. Starting at 5 wk of age, mice of these 4 genotypes were switched from the basal low-cholesterol chow diet to chow containing a high level of added cholesterol (1% wt/wt) for 2 wk. Hepatic cholesterol levels and transaminase activities were then measured. Their body weights (g) at study were as follows: Npc1+/+:Soat2+/+ 22.7 ± 0.7, Npc1+/+:Soat2−/− 22.3 ± 1.4, Npc1−/−:Soat2+/+ 19.9 ± 1.2, Npc1−/−:Soat2−/− 20.0 ± 0.9. The data are presented as follows: liver weight (A), unesterified and esterified cholesterol concentrations in liver (B and C, respectively), total cholesterol content of whole liver (D), and plasma activities of ALT and AST (E and F, respectively). Values are means ± SE of data from 4 mice in each group except for the mice deficient in both NPC1 and SOAT2 where there were 8 animals. Each group consisted of essentially equal numbers of male and female mice. a,b,cStatistically significant differences as determined by 1-way ANOVA. chol, cholesterol; conc, concentration.