title: Taurine and vitamin E supplementations have minimal effects on body composition, hepatic lipids, and blood hormone and metabolite concentrations in healthy Sprague Dawley rats.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  As prescriptions for off-label pharmaceutical use and autonomous administration of over-the-counter nutraceuticals become mainstream, thorough assessments of these compounds are warranted.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To determine the effects of gemfibrozil, rosiglitazone, metformin, taurine, and vitamin E on body composition, hepatic lipids, and metabolic hormone and blood metabolite concentrations in a healthy, outbred rat cohort.
  
  
  METHODS
  Male Sprague Dawley rats were fed a purified 10 kcal% from fat diet for 56 days and assigned to diet alone (control) or diet plus oral administration of gemfibrozil (34 mg/kg), metformin (500 mg/kg), rosiglitazone (3 mg/kg), taurine (520 mg/kg), or vitamin E (200 mg/kg).
  
  
  RESULTS
  Rosiglitazone administration resulted in a 56% increase in carcass adiposity, cautioning potential prescriptive off-label use. Taurine supplementation had no adverse effects on evaluated parameters. A modest but significant increase in liver triacylglycerol content was observed with vitamin E supplementation compared with control (Δ 17.2 g triacylglycerol/100 g liver lipid).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The evaluated pharmaceuticals had effects in a healthy population similar to the reported effects in their target population and the nutraceuticals had minimal effects on the measured physiological parameters.
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal Science, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America.
authors.forename: Portia S
authors.initials: PS
authors.lastname: Allen
authors.affiliation: Nutrition Obesity Research Center and Office of Energetics, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama, United States of America.
authors.forename: Andrew W
authors.initials: AW
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Biophysics, and Molecular Biology, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America.
authors.forename: Michelle M Bohan
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical Sciences, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America.
authors.forename: Walter H
authors.initials: WH
authors.lastname: Hsu
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal Science, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America.
authors.forename: Donald C
authors.initials: DC
authors.lastname: Beitz
keywords: animal model; gemfibrozil; metformin; thiazolidinedione