Fig. 7: AMPK activator (AICAR) attenuates APAP-induced acute liver injury under hyperglycemia.

Mice were subjected to STZ pretreatment and APAP administration as described in “Materials and methods” section. Both CON and STZ mice were pretreated with AMPK activator (AICAR) or saline in vivo prior to APAP treatment. a, b Liver injury was evaluated 24 h post APAP treatment in terms of serum AST and ALT levels (n = 6/group). c Liver injury was evaluated in terms of liver histopathology. Representative of six mice/group. d TUNEL staining of liver sections (original magnification ×200). DAPI was used for nuclear staining. Representative of six mice/group. e The ratio of TUNEL-positive cells in different experimental groups (n = 6/group). f Bcl-2, Bcl-xL, and β-actin protein levels were measured by western blot. Representative of three experiments (mean ± SD, *p < 0.05)