Abstract

A high-fat diet can damage the muscle cells that make up our heart and this research suggests that it occurs due to a change at the cellular level caused by a protein, Nox2, which becomes hyperactive, causing oxidative damage and triggering destructive hypertrophy. The study found that mice fed a high-fat diet had twice the Nox2 activity, which also led to a similar amount of reactive oxygen species (ROS), a free radical body that is associated with pathological damage.