Abstract
Dietary restriction (DR) extends lifespan in man species and modulates evolutionary conserved signalling and metabolic pathways. Most of these studies were done in adult animals. Here we investigated fat phenotypes of C. elegans larvae and adults which were exposed to DR during development. This approach was named “developmental-DR” (dDR). Moderate as well as stringent dDR increased the triglyceride to protein ratio in L4 larvae and adult worms. This alteration was accompanied by a marked expansion of intestinal and hypodermal lipid droplets. In comparison to ad libitum condition, the relative proportion of fat stored in large lipid droplets (>50 µm3) was increased by a factor of about 5 to 6 in larvae exposed to dDR. Microarray-based expression profiling identified several dDR-regulated genes of lipolysis and lipogenesis which may contribute to the observed fat phenotypes. In conclusion, dDR increases the triglyceride to protein ratio, enlarges lipid droplets and alters the expression of genes functioning in lipid metabolism in C. elegans. These changes might be an effective adaptation to conserve fat stores in animals subjected to limiting food supply during development.
Highlights
Dietary restriction (DR) known as caloric restriction (CR) is defined as a significant reduction of energy and macronutrient intake in the absence of malnutrition [1]
Establishment of a dietary restriction (DR) protocol which allows the application of DR during development from hatching to adulthood
Based on reported DR methods [24,32], here we established a modified solid medium based DR protocol in order to study the effect of DR on C. elegans larvae and adults exposed to DR during development (Figure 1)
Summary
Dietary restriction (DR) known as caloric restriction (CR) is defined as a significant reduction of energy and macronutrient intake in the absence of malnutrition [1]. DR is a fundamental nutritional intervention to reduce body weight and to decrease the risk of common diseases such diabetes type 2 or atherosclerosis [2,3] It extends lifespan and health-span in many species, ranging from invertebrates to mammals [3]. The short-lived model organisms Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Drosophila melanogaster and Caenorhabditis elegans were used to uncover key regulatory factors mediating DR induced longevity. These include the target of rapamycin TOR [4,5,6], the AMP-activated protein kinase AMPK [7] and the Insulin/IGF-1 signaling cascade [8]. Most of these pathways were identified in adult animals
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