Establishment of a methodology for investigating protectants against ethanol-induced hepatotoxicity

Ethanol-induced liver injury has been extensively reported in clinic, but still lacks an efficient in vitro platform for investigating its hepatotoxicity and protectants. This study aimed to establish a methodology on the culture conditions regarding the sealability against evaporation of ethanol, culture medium and 2D/3D culture of hepatocytes. Based on the experimental findings, it was indicated that the ethanol evaporation from culture plates was a severe problem reducing its toxicity in hepatocyte. According to the detected ethanol toxic response marked by reduced cell viability, 3D cultured hepatocytes in gel entrapment were suggested to be better than 2D hepatocyte in monolayer, but the cultures in either William’s Medium E or DMEM exhibited comparable sensitivity to ethanol toxicity. Subsequently, 3D cultured hepatocytes with Parafilm sealing were systematically illustrated to well reflect the ethanol-induced lipid accumulation, reactive oxygen species/malondialdehyde generation, glutathione depletion and cytochrome 2E1 induction. Finally, such hepatocyte models were proposed as a platform for screening of herbal component against ethanol hepatotoxicity. Nano-silibinin, for the first time, found to perform significant protection against ethanol-induced hepatotoxicity while silibinin in normal particles could not inhibit such toxicity. This protection of nano-silibinin might relate to its improved bioavailability compared to normal insoluble silibinin and could act as an anti-oxidative and anti-steatosis agent against ethanol-induced hepatotoxicity.