Dataset Information

A Novel Automated System Yields Reproducible Temporal Feeding Patterns in Laboratory Rodents.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The impact of temporal feeding patterns remains a major unanswered question in nutritional science. Progress has been hampered by the absence of a reliable method to impose temporal feeding in laboratory rodents, without the confounding influence of food-hoarding behavior.

Objective

The aim of this study was to develop and validate a reliable method for supplying crushed diets to laboratory rodents in consistent, relevant feeding patterns for prolonged periods.

Methods

We programmed our experimental feeding station to deliver a standard diet [StD; Atwater Fuel Energy (AFE) 13.9% fat] or high-fat diet (HFD; AFE 45% fat) during nocturnal grazing [providing 1/24th of the total daily food intake (tdF/I) of ad libitum-fed controls every 30 min] and meal-fed (3 × 1-h periods of ad libitum feeding) patterns in male rats (Sprague-Dawley: 4 wk old, 72-119 g) and mice [C57/Bl6J wild-type (WT): 6 mo old, 29-37 g], and ghrelin-null littermates (Ghr-/-; 27-34 g).

Results

Grazing yielded accurate, consistent feeding events in rats, with an approximately linear rise in nocturnal cumulative food intake [tdF/I (StD): 97.4 ± 1.5% accurate compared with manual measurement; R2 = 0.86; tdF/I (HFD): 99.0 ± 1.4% accurate; R2 = 0.86]. Meal-feeding produced 3 nocturnal meals of equal size and duration in StD-fed rats (tdF/I: 97.4 ± 0.9% accurate; R2 = 0.90), whereas the second meal size increased progressively in HFD-fed rats (44% higher on day 35 than on day 14; P < 0.01). Importantly, cumulative food intake in grazing and meal-fed rats was identical. Similar results were obtained in WT mice except that less restricted grazing induced hyperphagia (compared with meal-fed WT mice; P < 0.05 from day 1). This difference was abolished in Ghr-/- mice, with meal initiation delayed and meal duration enhanced. Neither pattern elevated corticosterone secretion in rats, but meal-feeding aligned ultradian pulses.

Conclusions

We have established a consistent, measurable, researcher-defined, stress-free method for imposing temporal feeding patterns in rats and mice. This approach will facilitate progress in understanding the physiologic impact of feeding patterns.

SUBMITTER: Tilston TW

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6736427 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

A Novel Automated System Yields Reproducible Temporal Feeding Patterns in Laboratory Rodents.

Tilston Thomas W TW Brown Richard D RD Wateridge Matthew J MJ Arms-Williams Bradley B Walker Jamie J JJ Sun Yuxiang Y Wells Timothy T

The Journal of nutrition 20190901 9

<h4>Background</h4>The impact of temporal feeding patterns remains a major unanswered question in nutritional science. Progress has been hampered by the absence of a reliable method to impose temporal feeding in laboratory rodents, without the confounding influence of food-hoarding behavior.<h4>Objective</h4>The aim of this study was to develop and validate a reliable method for supplying crushed diets to laboratory rodents in consistent, relevant feeding patterns for prolonged periods.<h4>Metho ...[more]

PMID: 31287142

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Project description:BackgroundWhole genome duplication (WGD) events are common in the evolutionary history of many living organisms. For decades, researchers have been trying to understand the genetic and epigenetic impact of WGD and its underlying molecular mechanisms. Particular attention was given to allopolyploid study systems, species resulting from an hybridization event accompanied by WGD. Investigating the mechanisms behind the survival of a newly formed allopolyploid highlighted the key role of DNA methylation. With the improvement of high-throughput methods, such as whole genome bisulfite sequencing (WGBS), an opportunity opened to further understand the role of DNA methylation at a larger scale and higher resolution. However, only a few studies have applied WGBS to allopolyploids, which might be due to lack of genomic resources combined with a burdensome data analysis process. To overcome these problems, we developed the Automated Reproducible Polyploid EpiGenetic GuIdance workflOw (ARPEGGIO): the first workflow for the analysis of epigenetic data in polyploids. This workflow analyzes WGBS data from allopolyploid species via the genome assemblies of the allopolyploid's parent species. ARPEGGIO utilizes an updated read classification algorithm (EAGLE-RC), to tackle the challenge of sequence similarity amongst parental genomes. ARPEGGIO offers automation, but more importantly, a complete set of analyses including spot checks starting from raw WGBS data: quality checks, trimming, alignment, methylation extraction, statistical analyses and downstream analyses. A full run of ARPEGGIO outputs a list of genes showing differential methylation. ARPEGGIO was made simple to set up, run and interpret, and its implementation ensures reproducibility by including both package management and containerization.ResultsWe evaluated ARPEGGIO in two ways. First, we tested EAGLE-RC's performance with publicly available datasets given a ground truth, and we show that EAGLE-RC decreases the error rate by 3 to 4 times compared to standard approaches. Second, using the same initial dataset, we show agreement between ARPEGGIO's output and published results. Compared to other similar workflows, ARPEGGIO is the only one supporting polyploid data.ConclusionsThe goal of ARPEGGIO is to promote, support and improve polyploid research with a reproducible and automated set of analyses in a convenient implementation. ARPEGGIO is available at https://github.com/supermaxiste/ARPEGGIO .

Dataset Information

A Novel Automated System Yields Reproducible Temporal Feeding Patterns in Laboratory Rodents.

Background

Objective

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Publications

A Novel Automated System Yields Reproducible Temporal Feeding Patterns in Laboratory Rodents.

Similar Datasets

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