Decreased FXR Agonism in the Bile Acid Pool Is Associated with Impaired FXR Signaling in a Pig Model of Pediatric NAFLD.

The objective of this study was to investigate whether the impairment of farnesoid X receptor (FXR)-fibroblast growth factor 19 (FGF19) signaling in juvenile pigs with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is associated with changes in the composition of the enterohepatic bile acid pool. Eighteen 15-day-old Iberian pigs, pair-housed in pens, were allocated to receive either a control (CON) or high-fructose, high-fat (HFF) diet. Animals were euthanized in week 10, and liver, blood, and distal ileum (DI) samples were collected. HFF-fed pigs developed NAFLD and had decreased FGF19 expression in the DI and lower FGF19 levels in the blood. Compared with the CON, the HFF diet increased the total cholic acid (CA) and the CA to chenodeoxycholic acid (CDCA) ratio in the liver, DI, and blood. CA and CDCA levels in the DI were negatively and positively correlated with ileal FGF19 expression, respectively, and blood levels of FGF19 decreased with an increasing ileal CA to CDCA ratio. Compared with the CON, the HFF diet increased the gene expression of hepatic 12-alpha-hydrolase, which catalyzes the synthesis of CA in the liver. Since CA species are weaker FXR ligands than CDCA, our results suggest that impairment of FXR-FGF19 signaling in NAFLD pigs is associated with a decrease in FXR agonism in the bile acid pool.

Olive- and Coconut-Oil-Enriched Diets Decreased Secondary Bile Acids and Regulated Metabolic and Transcriptomic Markers of Brain Injury in the Frontal Cortexes of NAFLD Pigs.

The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of dietary fatty acid (FA) saturation and carbon chain length on brain bile acid (BA) metabolism and neuronal number in a pig model of pediatric NAFLD. Thirty 20-day-old Iberian pigs, pair-housed in pens, were randomly assigned to receive one of three hypercaloric diets for 10 weeks: (1) lard-enriched (LAR; n = 5 pens), (2) olive-oil-enriched (OLI, n = 5), and (3) coconut-oil-enriched (COC; n = 5). Pig behavior and activity were analyzed throughout the study. All animals were euthanized on week 10 and frontal cortex (FC) samples were collected for immunohistochemistry, metabolomic, and transcriptomic analyses. Data were analyzed by multivariate and univariate statistics. No differences were observed in relative brain weight, neuronal number, or cognitive functioning between diets. Pig activity and FC levels of neuroprotective secondary BAs and betaine decreased in the COC and OLI groups compared with LAR, and paralleled the severity of NAFLD. In addition, OLI-fed pigs showed downregulation of genes involved in neurotransmission, synaptic transmission, and nervous tissue development. Similarly, COC-fed pigs showed upregulation of neurogenesis and myelin repair genes, which caused the accumulation of medium-chain acylcarnitines in brain tissue. In conclusion, our results indicate that secondary BA levels in the FCs of NAFLD pigs are affected by dietary FA composition and are associated with metabolic and transcriptomic markers of brain injury. Dietary interventions that aim to replace saturated FAs by medium-chain or monounsaturated FAs in high-fat hypercaloric diets may have a negative effect on brain health in NAFLD patients.

%polynova_2way: A SAS macro for implementation of mixed models for metabolomics data.

The generation of large metabolomic data sets has created a high demand for software that can fit statistical models to one-metabolite-at-a-time on hundreds of metabolites. We provide the %polynova_2way macro in SAS to identify metabolites differentially expressed in study designs with a two-way factorial treatment and hierarchical design structure. For each metabolite, the macro calculates the least squares means using a linear mixed model with fixed and random effects, runs a 2-way ANOVA, corrects the P-values for the number of metabolites using the false discovery rate or Bonferroni procedure, and calculate the P-value for the least squares mean differences for each metabolite. Finally, the %polynova_2way macro outputs a table in excel format that combines all the results to facilitate the identification of significant metabolites for each factor. The macro code is freely available in the Supporting Information.

Inhibition of Mitochondrial p53 Accumulation by PFT-µ Prevents Cisplatin-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy.

Chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN), a debilitating major side effect of cancer treatment, is characterized by pain and sensory loss in hand and feet. Platinum-based chemotherapeutics like cisplatin frequently induce CIPN. The molecular mechanism underlying these neurotoxic symptoms is incompletely understood and there are no preventive or curative interventions. We hypothesized that cisplatin acts as a cellular stressor that triggers p53 accumulation at mitochondria, leading to mitochondrial dysfunction and CIPN. To test this hypothesis, we examined the effect of the small molecule pifithrin-µ (PFT-µ), an inhibitor of p53 mitochondrial association on CIPN and the associated mitochondrial dysfunction. We show here for the first time that in vivo cisplatin rapidly increases mitochondrial accumulation of p53 in dorsal root ganglia (DRG), spinal cord, and peripheral nerve without evidence for apoptosis. Cisplatin-treatment also reduced mitochondrial membrane potential and lead to abnormal mitochondrial morphology and impaired mitochondrial function in DRG neurons. Pre-treatment with PFT-µ prevented the early cisplatin-induced increase in mitochondrial p53 and the reduction in mitochondrial membrane potential. Inhibition of the early mitochondrial p53 accumulation by PFT-µ also prevented the abnormalities in mitochondrial morphology and mitochondrial bioenergetics (reduced oxygen consumption rate, maximum respiratory capacity, and adenosine triphosphate synthesis) that develop in DRG and peripheral nerve after cisplatin-treatment. Functionally, inhibition of mitochondrial p53 accumulation prevented the hallmarks of CIPN including mechanical allodynia, peripheral sensory loss (numbness) as quantified by an adhesive-removal task, and loss of intra-epidermal nerve fibers. In conclusion, PFT-µ is a potential neuroprotective agent that prevents cisplatin-induced mitochondrial dysfunction in DRG and peripheral nerves thereby protecting against CIPN through blockade of the early cisplatin-induced increase in mitochondrial p53. Notably, there is accumulating evidence that PFT-µ has anti-tumor activities and could therefore be an attractive candidate to prevent CIPN while promoting tumor cell death.

Pifithrin-µ Prevents Cisplatin-Induced Chemobrain by Preserving Neuronal Mitochondrial Function.

Cognitive impairment, termed chemobrain, is a common neurotoxicity associated with chemotherapy treatment, affecting an estimated 78% of patients. Prompted by the hypothesis that neuronal mitochondrial dysfunction underlies chemotherapy-induced cognitive impairment (CICI), we explored the efficacy of administering the small-molecule pifithrin (PFT)-µ, an inhibitor of mitochondrial p53 accumulation, in preventing CICI. Male C57BL/6J mice injected with cisplatin ± PFT-µ for two 5-day cycles were assessed for cognitive function using novel object/place recognition and alternation in a Y-maze. Cisplatin impaired performance in the novel object/place recognition and Y-maze tests. PFT-µ treatment prevented CICI and associated cisplatin-induced changes in coherency of myelin basic protein fibers in the cingular cortex and loss of doublecortin+ cells in the subventricular zone and hippocampal dentate gyrus. Mechanistically, cisplatin decreased spare respirator capacity of brain synaptosomes and caused abnormal mitochondrial morphology, which was counteracted by PFT-µ administration. Notably, increased mitochondrial p53 did not lead to cerebral caspase-3 activation or cytochrome-c release. Furthermore, PFT-µ administration did not impair the anticancer efficacy of cisplatin and radiotherapy in tumor-bearing mice. Our results supported the hypothesis that neuronal mitochondrial dysfunction induced by mitochondrial p53 accumulation is an underlying cause of CICI and that PFT-µ may offer a tractable therapeutic strategy to limit this common side-effect of many types of chemotherapy. Cancer Res; 77(3); 742-52. ©2016 AACR.