Lipid profile in mice fed a high-fat diet after exogenous leptin administration

Previous studies suggest a possible link between leptin and decreased lipid levels, however, the role of leptin in high-fat diet-induced hyperlipidemia remains unclear. The aim of our study was to evaluate the effect of administering leptin on plasma and tissue lipids in mice fed a high-fat diet. Feeding a high-fat diet (2% cholesterol, 0.125% bile salts, 5% peanut oil) to four-week-old healthy mice for a period of 45 days, resulted in significantly elevated levels of plasma and tissue total cholesterol, phospholipids, free fatty acids and triglycerides as compared with those of the control mice. Subsequently after thirty days, exogenous leptin (230 microg/kg i.p.) was administered simultaneously with the daily dose of high-fat diet every alternate day for fifteen days. Leptin administration significantly reduced the levels of total cholesterol, phospholipids, free fatty acids and triglycerides in the plasma, liver, heart and kidney of both the control and high-fat diet fed mice. Moreover, leptin administration markedly reduced the levels of plasma LDL, VLDL and elevated plasma HDL and the activity of lipoprotein lipase as compared with the untreated control and high-fat diet fed mice. Thus, leptin administration was found to have a marked protective effect against hyperlipidemia and thus obesity, by virtue of its lipid lowering effects.