Arginine reverses alcohol-induced damage to the liver – even though alcohol continues to be ingested. This is the result of a study on rats.
The researchers gave the test animals different amounts of alcohol and arginine and measured inflammation levels; later, they analyzed the liver tissue to see how severe the damage was. “After arginine administration, there was a marked improvement in pathological changes, accompanied by decreased endotoxin levels, lipid peroxidation, activation of nuclear factor-kappaB, tumor necrosis factor-alpha, cyclooxygenase-2, inducible nitric oxide and nitrotyrosine staining,” they write.
They are still puzzling over the mechanism in their article – either the arginine acts directly, or indirectly by increasing nitric oxide.
J Pharmacol Exp Ther.: Arginine reverses ethanol-induced inflammatory and fibrotic changes in liver despite continued ethanol administration
