Abstract
Exercise has been known to reduce the risk of obesity and metabolic syndrome, but the mechanisms underlying many exercise benefits remain unclear. This is, in part, due to a lack of exercise paradigms in invertebrate model organisms that would allow rapid mechanistic studies to be conducted. Here we report a novel exercise paradigm in Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) that can be implemented under standard laboratory conditions. Mechanical stimulus in the form of vibration was transduced to C. elegans grown on solid agar media using an acoustic actuator. One day post-exercise, the exercised animals showed greater physical fitness compared to the un-exercised controls. Despite having higher mitochondrial reactive oxygen species levels, no mitohormetic adaptations and lifespan extension were observed in the exercised animals. Nonetheless, exercised animals showed lower triacylglycerides (TAG) accumulation than the controls. Among the individual TAG species, the most significant changes were found in mono- and polyunsaturated fatty acid residues. Such alteration resulted in an overall lower double bond index and peroxidation index which measure susceptibility towards lipid peroxidation. These observations are consistent with findings from mammalian exercise literature, suggesting that exercise benefits are largely conserved across different animal models.
Highlights
IntroductionObesity and lack of physical activity (sedentary lifestyle) are growing public health problems in many developed nations[1]
Obesity and lack of physical activity are growing public health problems in many developed nations[1]
This set up can be used to transmit vibration at arbitrary frequency and amplitude to the animals on agar plate (Fig. 1A). One challenge with this approach is that it depends on behavioural changes in response to vibration, which are known to be subject to habituation[29]
Summary
Obesity and lack of physical activity (sedentary lifestyle) are growing public health problems in many developed nations[1]. Sedentary lifestyles are closely related to increases in the fraction of the population that is overweight or obese, but a lack of physical activity is harmful beyond its immediate effect on weight and is associated with an increased risk of cancer and cardiovascular diseases[7,8]. While several exercise studies have profiled Triacylglyceride (TAG), lipoproteins and phospholipids, there hasn’t been a comprehensive lipidomics investigation at a detailed molecular species level[17,18] This is, in part, due to a lack of exercise paradigm for invertebrate model organism that would allow mechanistic studies to be conducted more rapidly. Two independent groups have developed different exercise protocols based on forced swimming of C. elegans[26,27] While these paradigms have demonstrated the feasibility of using C. elegans to study key mechanisms underlying exercise benefits, the use of swimming as an exercise imposes several limitations. Having a complementary exercise paradigm for C. elegans, ideally based on standard NGM would allow comparison and verification of results obtained in liquid medium
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