Adult male Sprague-Dawley rats (initial weight ~250-350 g; Charles River Laboratory, Wilmington, MA) were fed the Lieber-DeCarli liquid diet (Research Diets, New Brunswick, NJ) containing alcohol (ethanol; 36% of total calories) or an isocaloric carbohydrate substitution. Alcohol-fed rats received 1/3 strength alcohol diet (12% of total calories) for one week, 2/3 strength alcohol diet (24% of total calories) for one week, followed by four weeks of the full strength alcohol diet, for a total of six weeks of alcohol ingestion. In some of the alcohol-fed rats, zinc acetate (100 mg/L) was added to the diet. We previously determined that this dose normalizes alveolar epithelial and macrophage function in alcohol-fed rats and correlates on mg/kg basis with the recommended dosing of dietary supplementation for zinc deficiency in humans (Joshi et al., 2008). All work was performed with the approval of the Atlanta VAMC Institutional Care and Use of Animals Committee.
