School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287-4501, USA.
Front Zool. 2014 Mar 22;11(1):26. doi: 10.1186/1742-9994-11-26.
Nutrient availability, assimilation, and allocation can have important and lasting effects on the immune system development of growing animals. Though carotenoid pigments have immunostimulatory properties in many animals, relatively little is known regarding how they influence the immune system during development. Moreover, studies linking carotenoids to health at any life stage have largely been restricted to birds and mammals. We investigated the effects of carotenoid supplementation on multiple aspects of immunity in juvenile veiled chameleons (Chamaeleo calyptratus). We supplemented half of the chameleons with lutein (a xanthophyll carotenoid) for 14 weeks during development and serially measured multiple aspects of immune function, including: agglutination and lysis performance of plasma, wound healing, and plasma nitric oxide concentrations before and after wounding.
Though lutein supplementation effectively elevated circulating carotenoid concentrations throughout the developmental period, we found no evidence that carotenoid repletion enhanced immune function at any point. However, agglutination and lysis scores increased, while baseline nitric oxide levels decreased, as chameleons aged.
Taken together, our results indicate that body mass and age, but not carotenoid access, may play an important role in immune performance of growing chameleons. Hence, studying well-understood physiological processes in novel taxa can provide new perspectives on alternative physiological processes and nutrient function.
营养物质的可利用性、吸收和分配会对生长中动物的免疫系统发育产生重要且持久的影响。尽管类胡萝卜素在许多动物中具有免疫刺激特性，但关于它们如何在发育过程中影响免疫系统的知识相对较少。此外，将类胡萝卜素与任何生命阶段的健康联系起来的研究在很大程度上仅限于鸟类和哺乳动物。我们研究了类胡萝卜素补充对幼年变色龙（Chamaeleo calyptratus）免疫系统多个方面的影响。我们在发育过程中用叶黄素（一种叶黄素类胡萝卜素）对一半的变色龙进行了 14 周的补充，并连续测量了多个方面的免疫功能，包括：血浆的凝集和溶解性能、伤口愈合以及受伤前后的血浆一氧化氮浓度。
尽管叶黄素补充剂有效地在整个发育期提高了循环类胡萝卜素浓度，但我们没有发现类胡萝卜素补充剂在任何时候增强免疫功能的证据。然而，随着变色龙年龄的增长，凝集和溶解评分增加，而基础一氧化氮水平降低。
总的来说，我们的结果表明，体重和年龄，而不是类胡萝卜素的获取，可能在生长中变色龙的免疫表现中发挥重要作用。因此，在新分类单元中研究了解透彻的生理过程可以为替代生理过程和营养功能提供新的视角。
