ROS antagonizes the protection of Parkin-mediated mitophagy against aluminum-induced liver inflammatory injury in mice

Aluminum (Al) is a food pollutant that has extensive deleterious effects on the liver. Our previous research proposed that E3 ubiquitin ligase PARK2 knockout (Parkin(-/-)) could aggravate Al-induced liver damage by inhibiting mitophagy, during which the reactive oxygen species (ROS) content increases. Inhibition of mitophagy can activate inflammasome. But the link between Parkin-mediated mitophagy and liver inflammatory injury caused by Al, and the role of ROS in it remain unclear. In this study, we applied Al, Parkin(-/-)and N-acetyl-L-cysteine (NAC) to act on C57BL/6N mice to investigate them. We found that Al could induce liver inflammatory injury and Parkin(-/-)could aggravate it. Meanwhile, inhibition of ROS alleviated oxidative stress, mitochondrial damage, mitophagy and inflammatory injury caused by Al in Parkin(-/- )mice liver. These results indicated that ROS antagonized the protection of Parkin-mediated mitophagy against Al-induced liver inflammatory damage in mice.