About 80 million Americans have fatty liver disease unrelated to alcohol abuse. Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease is associated with obesity and diabetes, and can lead to more severe liver damage such as nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), cirrhosis and liver cancer. Cardiovascular disease, colorectal cancer and breast cancer actually are the major causes of death in patients with fatty liver disease.

Several drugs in advanced stages of development have failed because of the complexity of the disease, low efficacy, or the toxicity of drugs. Although several clinical trials were conducted in past decades, currently there is no FDA-approved pharmaceutical therapy for NASH.

To understand the complexity of the progression of fatty liver disease, a team of USC.