CBD and CBG May Reverse Fatty Liver Disease: What the Hebrew University Study Found

A study published in the British Journal of Pharmacology earlier this year by researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem has produced some of the most compelling evidence yet that non-psychoactive cannabis compounds can address a condition that affects roughly one-third of the world's adult population: fatty liver disease.

The study, led by Prof. Joseph (Yossi) Tam, Dr. Liad Hinden, and PhD student Radka Kočvarová at the School of Pharmacy in the Faculty of Medicine, found that cannabidiol (CBD) and cannabigerol (CBG) — two cannabinoids that don't produce a high — can improve liver health by fundamentally changing how liver cells manage energy and clean up cellular waste.

If these findings translate to human clinical trials, they could point toward the first effective drug treatment for a disease that currently has almost no pharmaceutical options.

The Disease Nobody Talks About

Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease, or MASLD — formerly known as non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) — is the most common chronic liver disorder in the world. It affects approximately one-third of the global adult population and is closely linked to obesity, high blood pressure, insulin resistance, and Type 2 diabetes.

What makes MASLD particularly dangerous is that it's largely silent. Most people with fatty liver disease don't know they have it until it progresses to more serious stages — inflammation, fibrosis, cirrhosis, or even liver cancer. There's currently no FDA-approved pharmaceutical treatment specifically designed for MASLD. The standard medical advice is lifestyle modification: lose weight, exercise more, eat better. This works for some patients, but for millions of others, the disease progresses despite their best efforts.

The pharmaceutical industry has been chasing a MASLD drug for years, and the pipeline is full of candidates in various stages of clinical trials. But the fact remains that as of 2026, if you're diagnosed with fatty liver disease, your doctor essentially tells you to change your life and hopes for the best. That's the gap this research aims to fill.

What the Researchers Found

The Hebrew University team investigated how CBD and CBG affect liver cells at the metabolic level, and their findings revealed two distinct mechanisms of action that work in complementary ways.

Energy Backup Restoration. CBD and CBG treatment significantly increased phosphocreatine levels within liver cells. Phosphocreatine acts as a kind of cellular "backup battery" — it stores energy that cells can draw on when their primary energy supply is depleted. In fatty liver disease, this backup system is compromised. The liver cells become so overwhelmed by fat accumulation that their energy management systems break down. By restoring phosphocreatine levels, CBD and CBG essentially give liver cells their emergency power supply back.

Autophagy Activation. The second mechanism is perhaps even more significant. CBD and CBG restored the activity of autophagy — the cellular process by which cells break down and recycle their own damaged components and harmful waste. Think of autophagy as the cell's internal cleanup crew. In healthy cells, autophagy runs continuously, clearing out broken proteins, damaged organelles, and accumulated waste. In fatty liver disease, autophagy becomes impaired, leading to a buildup of cellular debris that further damages the liver.

By reactivating autophagy, CBD and CBG don't just prevent further fat accumulation — they help the liver clean up the mess that's already there. This dual action — restoring energy management and reactivating waste removal — addresses fatty liver disease at its metabolic roots rather than just treating symptoms.

Why CBD and CBG Together

The decision to study CBD and CBG together wasn't arbitrary. While CBD has been the subject of extensive research over the past decade, CBG — cannabigerol — is increasingly recognized as a cannabinoid with distinct and potentially complementary therapeutic properties.

CBG is often called the "mother cannabinoid" because it's the precursor from which other cannabinoids are synthesized in the cannabis plant. In its own right, CBG has demonstrated anti-inflammatory properties in multiple preclinical studies, and there's growing evidence that it interacts with the endocannabinoid system through different pathways than CBD.

The Hebrew University study's approach — studying these compounds together rather than in isolation — aligns with the broader trend in cannabinoid research toward understanding how different cannabis compounds interact. The idea that cannabinoids may produce stronger therapeutic effects when used in combination rather than alone has gained significant scientific support in recent years, and this study adds another data point in favor of that hypothesis.

The Significance for Cannabis Medicine

This study matters for several reasons beyond the immediate liver disease application.

It adds to a growing body of evidence that non-psychoactive cannabinoids have genuine, measurable therapeutic effects through specific, identifiable mechanisms. This isn't "cannabis makes you feel better" — it's "CBD and CBG increase phosphocreatine levels and restore autophagy in hepatocytes." The level of mechanistic detail in this research makes it much harder to dismiss as placebo effect or wishful thinking.

It also demonstrates therapeutic potential for a condition with enormous unmet medical need. Fatty liver disease affects hundreds of millions of people worldwide, and the absence of effective pharmaceutical treatments means that even modest improvements could have an outsized impact on global health outcomes.

And it comes from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, one of the world's leading institutions for cannabinoid research. This is the university where Prof. Raphael Mechoulam first identified the structure of THC in 1964 and later discovered the endocannabinoid system — the foundational discoveries that made modern cannabis science possible. Research from this institution carries significant weight in the scientific community.

Limitations and Next Steps

It's important to note what this study doesn't prove. The research was conducted in preclinical models, meaning it demonstrated effects in laboratory and animal settings rather than in human patients. The history of pharmaceutical research is full of compounds that showed promise in preclinical studies but failed to replicate those results in human clinical trials.

The doses and delivery methods used in a controlled laboratory setting may not translate directly to the doses and delivery methods available to consumers. Taking CBD oil from a dispensary is not the same as receiving a precisely formulated pharmaceutical preparation in a clinical trial, and no one should interpret this study as medical advice to self-treat fatty liver disease with over-the-counter CBD products.

What this study does provide is a strong scientific rationale for advancing CBD and CBG into human clinical trials for MASLD — and given the size of the patient population and the lack of existing treatments, there's likely to be no shortage of interest from both the pharmaceutical industry and the research community in pursuing those next steps.

The Bottom Line

The Hebrew University study represents the kind of rigorous, mechanism-focused research that cannabis science needs more of. It identifies specific biological pathways, demonstrates measurable effects, and points toward a therapeutic application with genuine unmet need.

For the millions of people living with fatty liver disease — many of whom don't even know they have it — the possibility of a cannabis-derived treatment is genuinely exciting. For the broader cannabis industry, it's another piece of evidence that the plant's medical potential extends far beyond pain and anxiety into areas of medicine that could affect hundreds of millions of lives.

The road from preclinical research to approved treatment is long. But it has to start somewhere, and this study is a promising beginning.

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