Reduced astrocytic expression of GFAP in the offspring of female rats that received hypercaloric diet

Abstract

Introduction: Obesity promotes hypothalamic inflammation and local morphological changes in astrocytes, including the increased expression of the astrocytic biomarker glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), which is seen as a sign of neuroinflammation.

Objective: This study aimed to observe the astrocytic expression of GFAP in different brain areas from female rats that received a hypercaloric (HD) or a normocaloric (ND) diet during puberty (F0 generation) as well as in their male pups (F1 generation).

Methods: Female rats received highly palatable HD (Ensure®) or ND from postnatal day (PND) 23–65. On PND90-95, some were euthanized for the immunohistochemical study and some were mated to obtain the F1 generation. Male pups were immunochallenged on PND50 with lipopolysaccharide (LPS, 100 μg/kg) or 0.9% saline solution (1 mL/kg) intraperitoneal injection. Body weight (BW) and retroperitoneal fat weight (RFW) were recorded on PND95 for F0 generation and on PND50 for F1 generation. GFAP expression for both generations was assessed by morphometry in the parietal/frontal cortex, corpus callosum, nucleus accumbens, arcuate/periventricular nuclei of hypothalamus, pons, molecular/granular layers of cerebellum.

Results: Female rats fed with HD presented a significant increase in the GFAP expression in all evaluated areas as well as in the RFW. Male rats born from mothers that received HD showed decreased GFAP expression, BW and RFW when treated with LPS in relation to those from mothers fed with ND.

Discussion: HD induced astrogliosis in several brain areas in females from F0 generation and an adaptive phenotypic change of decreased GFAP expression in males from F1 generation after LPS challenge.

Keywords:

• Astrocytes
• Central nervous system
• GFAP
• Hypercaloric diet
• Lipopolysaccharide
• Maternal diet
• Obesity
• Transgenerational effects

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful for the technical assistance of Vedovatto, P.A.

Disclaimer statements

Contributors MMB and EFB conceived and designed the experiments. JM, LVB, MFMM, AJ, CVC collected, analyzed, and interpreted the data. EFB wrote the manuscript. MFMM and EFB performed GFAP immunostaining. TBK and MMB were involved with drafting the article and revising it critically. All authors approved the final version of this manuscript.

Funding This research was supported by the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq).

Conflicts of interest None.

Ethical approval Ethics Committee on Care and Use of Laboratory Animal Resources of University Paulista, which approved the study protocol (protocol no. 130/12, CEUA/ICS/UNIP, 28/11/2012). All efforts were made to minimize the suffering of the animals.

ORCID

Leoni Vilano Bonamin http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9850-9491

Thiago Berti Kirsten http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4032-4355

Eduardo Fernandes Bondan http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3887-0023