Frontiers in Physiology (Dec 2011)

Identification of behavioural and metabolic factors predicting adiposity sensitivity to both high fat and high carbohydrate diets in rats.

  • Patrick Christian Even,
  • Nachiket A Nadkarni,
  • Catherine eChaumontet,
  • Dalila eAzzout,
  • Gilles eFromentin,
  • Daniel eTome

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3389/fphys.2011.00096
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 2

Abstract

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Individuals exhibit a great variation in their body weight gain response to a high-fat diet. Identification of predictive factors would enable better directed intervention towards susceptible individuals to treat obesity, and uncover potential mechanisms for treatment targeting. We set out to identify predictive behavioural and metabolic factors in an outbred rat model. 12 rats were analysed in metabolic cages for a period of 5 days during both high carbohydrate diet (HCD), and transition to a high fat diet (HFD). After a recovery period, rats were given a HFD for 6 days to identify those resistant or sensitive to it according to body weight gain. Rats were dissected at the end of the study to analyse body composition. This showed that in rats fed a HCD during most of their life, small differences in final body weight hid large variations in adiposity, allowing separation of rats into a second classification of carbohydrate-sensitive or -resistant. Meal size and meal number were found to be good predictors of sensitivity to a HFD, intensity of motor activity and ingestion speed good predictors of sensitivity to a HCD. Rats that were sensitive to the HCD could be resistant to the HFD and vice versa. This contributes to the idea that to be obesity prone does not necessarily need a HFD, it can also happen under a HCD, and be a hidden adiposity change with stable body weight.

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