Correlation of iNK T cells and lipid metabolism in visceral adipose tissue of high-fat diet-fed mice

ZHANG Peipei; XIN Junzhou; Chen Fei; CHANG Xiangyun; WANG Xiaoli

doi:10.13431/j.cnki.immunol.j.20250076

Abstract：Objective To observe the changes of invariant natural killer T(iNK T)cells in visceral adipose tissue and blood lipids of high-fat diet-fed mice,and to analyze the correlation between iNK T cells and lipid metabolism.Methods Fifty-two C57BL/6 mice were selected as the high-fat diet group,and 51 C57BL/6 mice as the normal control group.The high-fat diet intervention lasted for 12 weeks.At weeks 1,4,8,and 12,the epididymal and perirenal fats of mice in both groups were collected and weighed to record the visceral fat mass(VFM),and the changes in body fat content(BFC)were calculated.Flow cytometry and laser scanning confocal microscopy were used to detect the changes of invariant natural killer T(iNK T)cells in visceral adipose tissue.An automatic biochemical analyzer was used to measure the lipid levels in mice,and the correlations of iNKT cells in visceral adipose tissue with VFM,BFC,and serum lipid levels were analyzed.Results At 12 weeks after high-fat diet feeding,the body weight,VFM,BFC,serum total cholesterol(TC),triglyceride(TG)and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol(HDL-C)increased significantly,while the content of invariant natural killer T(iNK T)cells in visceral adipose tissue decreased obviously in the high-fat diet group,as compared with the control group(P＜0.01).The iNKT cell number in visceral adipose tissue of mice was negatively correlated with VFM,BFC,serum HDL-C and serum TG(r=-0.293,-0.289,-0.337,-0.199,P＜0.05),and was not correlated with serum TC and LDL-C(r=-0.122,-0.082,P＞0.05).Conclution VFM is increased and iNK T cell number is decreased in in adipose tissue of high-fat diet-fed mice.The number of iNK T cells is negatively correlated with VFM,BFC,serum HDL-C and TG.