Protective effect of curcumin against lipopolysaccharide-induced hepatotoxicity and liver dysfunction in rat

Background and objective: Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) as the major component of the outer membrane of gram-negative bacteria induced oxidative stress and had a role in hepatic injury. The aim of the present study was to investigate the protective effects of curcumin (Cur) against LPS -induced liver dysfunction in rat. Materials and Methods: The animals were divided into five groups: (1) control (2) LPS (3) LPS-Cur 5mg, (4) LPS-Cur 10mg and (5) LPS-Cur 15mg. LPS (1 mg/kg) was injected for 2 weeks and Cur (5, 10 and 15 mg/kg) was administered 30 min before LPS injection. Drugs were injected intraperitoneally. All data were expressed as mean ± SEM. SPSS software (11.5) was employed to evaluate the data. Findings: LPS induced liver dysfunction presented by increasing the serum level of alkaline phosphatase (ALK-P), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), aspartate aminotransferase (AST). Pretreatment with Cur restored harmful effects of LPS on liver function. In addition, LPS resulted in hepatotoxicity, accompanied by enhancing the level of malondialdehyde (MDA) and nitric oxide (NO) metabolites and decreasing the content of total thiol groups and superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT) activity. Injection of Cur before LPS attenuated LPS-induced hepatotoxicity through decreasing the level of MDA and NO metabolites and increasing total thiols and SOD and CAT activity. Conclusion: Considering the protective effect of Cur which was seen in the present study, it seems that Cur improved liver dysfunction by decreasing liver oxidative damage

کلیدواژه ها:

Lipopolysaccharide ، Curcumin ، liver ، oxidative stress