Cystine and the dietary production of fatty livers

Abstract

Groups of rats have been fed on a diet containing caseinogen 5, fat 40, glucose 44, marmite 5 and salts 5, with and without the addition of cystine, such that each rat ingested from 3.25 to 80 mgm. of cystine daily over periods of 14 to 21 days. If all the results be pooled and expressed on the basis of the 100 gm. rat, the average amt. of fat in the livers of 45 control animals was 1.077 gm.; that of the cystine-fed animals was 2.02 gm. This increase in liver fat is caused by some 50% increase in the % of fat in the liver, together with a 25% increase in the liver weight. Some abnormally high values were obtained in animals which received cystine, the highest being an animal in which the liver constituted 11.88% of the body weight, and contained 48.96% of its fresh weight as fat, which corresponds to the presence in the liver of a 100 gm. rat of 5.817 gm. of fat.