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Effects of lotus root and lotus leaf extracts on physical and sociopsychological stress in rats fed high fat diet
Author(s) -
Chang Kyung Ja,
You Jeong Soon,
Pant Asha,
Xu Zhao,
Huan Du
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.23.1_supplement.902.4
Subject(s) - lotus , triglyceride , physical stress , blood lipids , body weight , lotus effect , foot (prosody) , medicine , cholesterol , zoology , traditional medicine , biology , botany , raw material , ecology , linguistics , philosophy
Lotus has been known to be effective in the lowering of hyperlipidemic levels. But, there have not been reports regarding the effects of lotus in lowering serum lipid levels under stress. The present study was designed to determine the possible effect of lotus root and leaf extracts on physical and sociopsychological stress in rats which were fed a high fat diet. The experiments were performed with the use of young (5 weeks of age) male rats of Sprague‐Dawley strain. The rats were fed with high fat diets and orally administered once a day 200 mg/kg body weight of lotus root extract for 8 weeks. Physical stress and sociopsychological stress were exposed by foot‐shock for 1 hour (10 sec duration at intervals of 60 sec) everyday for 3 weeks using a communication box. The rats were divided into seven groups: CON (without stress), FS (Foot‐shocked group), NFS (Nonfoot‐shocked group), FSR(Foot‐shocked with lotus root extracts), FSL (Foot‐shocked with lotus leaf extracts), NFSR (Nonfoot‐shocked with lotus root extracts) and NFSL (Nonfoot‐shocked with lotus leaf extracts). The final body weight of the rats in the groups of FS, FSR and FSL were lower compared to the CON group. Prolonged 3‐week physical stress resulted in reduced total body weight gains. Blood triglyceride and total‐cholesterol levels were decreased by physical stress and blood total‐cholesterol level was increased by sociopsychological stress. The lipid lowering effect was the most prominent in the FSL group. Blood lipid levels of the sociopsychological stress groups showed an increasing tendency when lotus root and lotus leaf extracts were administered. These results suggest that administration of lotus leaf extracts on physical stress was effective in reducing lipid levels in a high fat diet.