Ashley Cast, Meenasri Kumbaji, Amber D'Souza, Katherine Rodriguez, Anita Gupta, Rebekah Karns, Lubov Timchenko, Nikolai Timchenko – 17 July 2019 – Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) involves development of hepatic steatosis, fibrosis, and steatohepatitis. Because hepatic steatosis appears first in NAFLD animal models, the current therapy development focuses on inhibition of hepatic steatosis, suggesting that further steps of NAFLD will be also inhibited. In this report, we show that the first event of NAFLD is liver proliferation, which drives fibrosis in NAFLD.