Hepatic transcriptomic analyses revealing the molecular pathogenesis of T2DM associated NAFLD in the ZDF rats

The ZDF rat, with spontaneous homozygous mutation of the leptin receptor gene (fa/fa), is one of the widely used animal model for studying the human type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Male ZDF rats have the symptoms of obesity and insulin resistance at a young age, accompanying with impaired islet function. However, their hepatic pathogenesis is still unclear. Based on the successive observations and the transcriptomic analyses of the liver tissue at 22 weeks old, we detected the typical clinical indications of T2DM, severe hepatic metabolic remodeling and the inflammatory liver injury in the ZDF rats. The integrin linked kinase signaling, as well as the endoplasmic reticulum stress and its downstream p38 MAPK signaling, seemed to play crucial roles in it. We have proved the ZDF rats could better simulate the pathogenesis of the human T2DM associated nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), and provided targets and reference for future T2DM studies. Overall design: Examined two samples and each has two repeats