Gordon C. J.(Executive), Aydın C.
Project Supported by Public Organizations in Other Countries, 2014 - 2017
It has become clear to us that there is a programmatic need to develop a “sedentary vs. active life style” animal model to refine our communities research effort. Combining our current studies that are assessing effects of high fat/high fructose diets on body composition, metabolism, behavior and susceptibility to ozone with a sedentary vs. active life style will allow us to refine our community-based models of obesity and susceptibility to air pollution.Cage-mounted, stainless steel running wheels provide rats with the opportunity to run volitionally. Wheel running activity is monitored electronically and is considered to be one of the best ways to develop a sedentary vs. active lifestyle model in rodents. Female rats run spontaneously at night and exhibit a variety of physiological changes that mimic patterns observed in exercising humans. Combining the sedentary-active lifestyle with our ongoing high fat diet treatments will provide us an ideal animal model to assess how diet-induced obesity and lack of activity impact on the susceptibility to air pollution.Protocol: Female Sprague-Dawley rats are housed in cages with or without running wheels and allowed to train for 12 weeks. Body composition and food consumption are monitored periodically. At the end of the training period, rats are exposed to one of three concentrations of ozone for 5 hr/day 1 day/week for 6 weeks. Running activity, body composition, and respiratory responses are assessed at various times after ozone exposure. Following the last ozone exposure, rats are terminated and lung lavage analysis is performed to further characterize if training affected the pulmonary responses to ozone exposure.