Abstract
Introduction: Chronic hyperglycemia drives hepatic inflammation in diabetes largely via the toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4)/nuclear factor kappa B1 (NFKB1) axis. Although exercise and taurine each possess anti-inflammatory properties, their combined effects on this pathway are unknown. This study investigated whether an 8-week combined exercise and taurine intervention, alone and in combination, downregulates hepatic TLR4 and NFKB1 mRNA expression in streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic rats.
Methods: Fifty male Wistar rats (8 weeks old) were randomly and equally assigned to healthy control (HC), diabetic control (DC), diabetic + taurine (DT; 100 mg/kg/day, i.p.), diabetic + exercise (DE), and DE + taurine (DET) groups. Diabetes was induced by a single intraperitoneal injection of STZ (55 mg/kg). Following the 8-week intervention, hepatic TLR4 and NFKB1 mRNA expression levels were quantified by real-time polymerase chain reaction.
Results: One-way ANOVA revealed significant group effects for TLR4 (η² = 0.90, P < 0.001) and NFKB1 (η² = 0.85, P < 0.001). All intervention groups demonstrated significantly lower TLR4 expression compared with the DC group. The DET group exhibited lower TLR4 expression than either intervention alone. For NFKB1, DT alone outperformed exercise alone (P = 0.002). Regarding NFKB1 expression, taurine supplementation alone produced the lowest values among the intervention groups. Finally, the addition of exercise to taurine conferred no further reduction compared with DT alone (P = 0.007).
Conclusion: Combined exercise training and taurine supplementation were associated with lower hepatic TLR4 expression, whereas taurine supplementation alone produced the greatest reduction in NFKB1 expression, suggesting that both interventions may contribute to attenuating diabetes-associated hepatic inflammation.