• Journal of Nutrition and Health
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• v.29 no.7
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• pp.689-702
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• 1996

The purpose of this experiment was to compare the effects of tryptophan administration on nutritional status of female rats which consumed reserpine and 6% casein diet with different carbohydrate contents(87%, 65%, 44% respective). Final body weight, body weight gain, FER, plasma amino acid concentration and microsomal cytochrome P 450 content in liver were measured and microscopic structure of hepatocytes was observed. In low-protein diet, the higher the carbohydrate content of diet was, the lower the damage was in the rat's liver. Tryptophan administration after dose of reserpine induced more effective recovery from liver damage of rats in high carbohydrate diet group than that in low carbohydrate diet group. In conclusion, the general nutritional assessments such as final body weight and body weight gain provided better estimate of the degree of structural changes in hepatocytes than functional assessment such as plasma amino acid concentration or liver microsomal cytochrome P450.