A Preliminary Application of Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy for Quantitatively Assessing Hepatic Fat and the Efficacy of Anti-obesity Therapy

Alcoholic and non-alcoholic fatty liver diseases cause insulin resistance and may develop into metabolic diseases such as steatohepatitis or type II diabetes. Standard histopathological examinations are routinely used to measure hepatic fat in order to assess and treat liver diseases, but this method is invasive, complicated, and time-consuming. Here, we present a noninvasive technique, localized magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), for quantitatively measuring hepatic fat in vivo and in situ. This method allowed us to create a relatively high-resolution time series from the same mouse. Further, it enabled us to examine the efficacy of cryptotanshinone (Ct) treatment in male mice with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease; MRS clearly showed that mice treated with Ct experienced a dramatic reduction in hepatic fat content compared with control mice. Thus, the localized MRS technique shows promise as a tool for in vivo assessments of drug efficacy against liver fat diseases and for early-stage disease prevention.