Fig. 1

Liver sample selection and study design. a Representative hepatic histology sections of liver tissues from dairy cows during partuition period. Oil Red O staining assay was used for fat content assessment in hepatic cells, therefore classified into normal liver (Norm) and fatty liver (FL), scale bar 500 μm. Blue dots indicate cell nucleus. Brown or red indicate lipid drops in cells that disovled Oil red. The right panel is a high-powered magnification of the black dashed area in the left panel. b Comparison of average percentage of hepatocytes containing lipid droplets in liver from Norm (n = 6) and FL (n = 8) groups. ***P < 0.001. c The whole experimental work-flow for the study