Effect of fat and sugar on liver fat
Research type
Research Study
Full title
The effect of a high fat compared to a high sugar diet on liver fat accumulation and metabolism.
IRAS ID
209901
Contact name
Leanne Hodson
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Oxford
Duration of Study in the UK
3 years, 0 months, 0 days
Research summary
In health, the liver should have very little fat in it, but if it starts to become filled with fat (something called non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD)) it can make us more at risk of getting heart disease or diabetes. Why fat starts to build up in the liver isn’t clear, but both the amount and type of food eaten may play an important role. It has been suggested that eating a lot of fat or sugar can increase the amount of fat within the liver and we would like to investigate this. \n\nWe will ask volunteers to eat two experimental (intervention) diets that do not have excess calories; one diet will be high in fat, but low in sugar and the other diet will be low in fat but high in sugar. Before volunteers consume the intervention diets, we would ask them to consume a diet, for seven days that is in-line with the UK healthy eating guidelines; this ensures all volunteers have a similar intake of fat, carbohydrate and protein – this is known as a standardisation diet. After consuming the standardisation diet, volunteers will eat one of the invention diets for a period of four weeks, then eat their usual diet for seven weeks before consuming the standardisation diet again for one week and the having the alternate intervention diet for a further four weeks. The order in which volunteers eat each intervention diet will be chosen at random. We will measure the amount of fat in their liver using a non-invasive, technique known as magnetic resonance imaging before they start and after they have consumed each experimental diet. We will also take blood samples from participants before and then after they have consumed the experimental diets to measure changes in blood fat and sugar levels.\n
REC name
North West - Preston Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
16/NW/0751
Date of REC Opinion
18 Oct 2016
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion