Abstract

Hepatic steatosis is characterized by the accumulation of lipid droplets (LDs), which are composed of a neutral lipid core surrounded by a phospholipid monolayer embedded with many proteins. While the LD-associated proteome has been investigated in multiple tissues and organisms, the dynamic changes in the murine LD-associated proteome in response to obesity and hepatic steatosis have not been studied. We characterized the hepatic LD-associated proteome of C57BL/6J male mouse livers following high fat feeding using isobaric tagging for relative and absolute quantification (iTRAQ). Of the 1520 proteins identified with a 5% local false discovery rate, we report a total of 48 proteins that were increased and 52 proteins that were decreased on LDs in response to high fat feeding. Most notably, ribosomal and ER proteins were increased, and extracellular and cytosolic proteins were decreased in response to high fat feeding. Additionally, many proteins involved in fatty acid catabolism or xenobiotic metabolism were enriched in the LD fraction following high fat feeding. In contrast, proteins involved in glucose metabolism and liver X receptor or retinoid X receptor activation were decreased on LDs of high fat fed mice. This study provides insights into unique biological functions of hepatic LDs under normal and steatotic conditions.