Regulation of lipid metabolism in rat leydig cells testosterone synthesis and proliferation

Aim: To induce rat model of hyperlipidemia through high fat diet feeding, exploring the effect of abnormal lipid metabolism in rat leydig cell testosterone biosynthesis and proliferation. Methods: 30 healthy male SD rats were randomly divided into normal group (NG) and the obese group (OG). Rats in NG were fed with basic diet, while rats in OG were continuously fed with high fat diet for 16 weeks to build the rat model of hyperlipidemia. After then we detected factors associated with testosterone biosynthesis and proliferation in rat Leydig cell at 0.8, 16 weeks, respectively. Results: Rats fed with high fat diet had lower blood testosterone levels compared with the normal rats, and the leydig cell testosterone biosynthesis related enzymes decreased. Moreover, the leydig cell of rats in OG decreased significantly and the expression of Ect2 (epithelial cell transforming sequence 2 oncogene) was lower than that of rats in NG. Conclusions: Rats fed with high fat diet had abnormal lipid metabolism which resulted in testosterone synthesis and proliferation capability of leydig cell decreasing. The potential mechanism was that some enzymes associated with testosterone biosynthesis, such as StAR, P450c were inhibited and the expression of Ect2 decreased, which played a role in regulating cell proliferation.