Obesity has emerged as a prevalent chronic metabolic disease of significant concern. This study investigates the efficacy of Semen Raphani (RS) in ameliorating high-fat diet (HFD)-induced obesity and quantifies liver fat using advanced MRI. Forty-eight male Sprague–Dawley(SD) rats were established as an obesity model and subsequently treated with varying doses of RS via oral gavage for one month. Postintervention, liver fat fractions were noninvasively quantified using the MRI IDEAL-IQ sequence and validated by histological staining. Additionally, 16S rRNA sequencing analyzed gut microbiota alterations. Results indicate that RS effectively reduces liver lipid accumulation and alleviates HFD-induced obesity. This research provides a systematic analysis of RS’s antiobesity effects and represents the first application of quantitative imaging for assessing liver fat in this model. This study offers a robust methodological framework for evaluating weight loss interventions and the therapeutic potential of RS in metabolic diseases.
Wang et al. (Tue,) studied this question.