How C15:0 Protects Liver Health

Healthy Aging

An In-Depth Study on C15:0 & Liver Health

A new study published in the Journal of Functional Foods assessed C15:0 for its ability to protect liver health. This study not only tested if C15:0 was protective, but how. Importantly, findings from this study repeated similar results reported across multiple studies from independent teams – including randomized, placebo controlled clinical trials. Together, these studies support that C15:0 is a liver protectant on numerous levels. Let’s dive in.

How did this study evaluate C15:0 as a liver protectant?

In this study, Kim et al. gave mice a high fat diet, which is well known to cause the following:

• Body weight gain
• High cholesterol and triglyceride levels
• Excess fat deposition in the liver
• Liver inflammation
• Impaired liver function (aka, elevated liver enzymes ALT and AST)

Understanding this, the researchers included the following six study groups, based on their diets:

• Healthy diet controls
• High fat diet controls
• High fat diet + 100 mg/kg high-C15:0 algae (Melosira nummuloides)
• High fat diet + 200 mg/kg high-C15:0 algae (Melosira nummuloides)
• High fat diet + 5 mg/kg pure C15:0
• High fat diet + 50 mg/kg pure C15:0

You may be thinking, what is Melosira nummuloides? Good question. Melosira nummuloides is a microalgae that contains a relatively high amount of C15:0 in a triglyceride form. The pure C15:0 used in this study was a pure, free fatty acid form of C15:0.

Here are the primary questions they sought to answer: Could either high-C15:0 algae or pure C15:0 effectively protect the liver and related metabolic factors in the face of a high fat diet?

I’m in. What did they find?

A lot. Both the high-C15:0 algae and pure C15:0 groups had significant liver protective effects. Notably, C15:0 delivered these benefits at much lower doses than the algae: 5 to 50 mg/kg versus 100 to 200 mg/kg, respectively. In many cases, the 5 mg/kg pure C15:0 dose was just as or more protective than the 200 mg/kg algae dose. That’s a 40x lower dose for pure C15:0. Understanding this, we’ll focus the results on pure C15:0, which held for both the 5 and 50 mg/kg doses:

• Mitigated body weight gain. C15:0 significantly lowered the amount of body weight gained on the high fat diet compared to the high fat diet control group.
• Supported healthy cholesterol and triglyceride levels. C15:0 effectively protected against the high fat-diet driven increase in triglycerides and total cholesterol, as well as the decrease in “good” HDL cholesterol. In other words, the C15:0 groups had lower triglycerides and total cholesterol, as well as higher HDL cholesterol.
• Supported healthy liver function. The C15:0 groups also had protected liver function, including lower AST and ALT. This benefit coincided with less liver fat in the C15:0 groups compared to the high fat diet controls.

In summary, this study showed that C15:0 protected not only liver health, but circulating cholesterol and triglyceride health, as well as a lowered proinflammatory state and lowered body weight gain in the face of a high fat diet.

Got it. But how did C15:0 exert these protective effects?

In their study, Kim et al. showed that – while challenged with a high fat diet – C15:0 protected metabolic and liver health using the following mechanisms:

• C15:0 significantly increased AMPK activation. AMPK is a metabolic balancer, including supporting healthy glucose control and insulin levels.
• C15:0 significantly lowered SREBP-1. SREBP-1 increases fat and cholesterol production in the liver.
• C15:0 significantly increased PPARɑ gene activity. PPARɑ is involved in fatty acid oxidation (aka, a fat burner).
• Further, C15:0 lowered the key proinflammatory cytokines, TNFɑ and IL-6. These cytokines are known to negatively affect liver function.
• C15:0 inhibited NF-kB. NF-kB is a pro-inflammatory pathway. C15:0’s ability to inhibit this pathway helps to explain how it lowers TNFɑ and IL-6.
• Finally, C15:0 also turned up multiple antioxidant activities, including restoring normal expression of SOD in the face of a high fat diet.

As such, this latest in-depth study showed that C15:0 taps into multiple mechanisms – including antioxidant and metabolic, liver, and immune protective activities – that explain how it supported healthy body weight, cholesterol levels, and liver function.