Kasanen Iiris, Inhilä Katja, Savontaus Eriika, Voipio Hanna-Marja, Õkva Kai, Mering Satu, Kiviniemi Vesa, Hau Jann, Laaksonen Sakari, Nevalainen Timo
1 Laboratory Animal Centre, University of Eastern Finland, Kuopio, Finland.
2 Department of Pharmacology, Drug Development and Therapeutics and Turku Center for Disease Modeling, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.
Lab Anim. 2018 Feb;52(1):29-37. doi: 10.1177/0023677217709850. Epub 2017 May 25.
Laboratory rats are generally fed ad libitum, although this method is associated with obesity and an increased frequency of spontaneous tumours. It has been challenging looking for ways to limit feed consumption in group-housed rats without any setbacks to animal welfare and scientific results. The diet board, as a method of dietary restriction, was used in the present study. Diet board feeding allows group housing and should result in enhanced welfare compared with traditional methods of dietary restriction. With respect to animal model robustness and translatability of results it is important that the feeding regime does not affect diurnal rhythmicity of biological parameters. In the present study the effects of diet board feeding on diurnal rhythms of blood glucose, serum ghrelin, faecal immunoglobulin A (IgA) and faecal corticosterone were assessed. The diet board did not alter diurnal rhythms, and adds weight to the use of this method for dietary restriction which should benefit animal health and the validity of scientific results generated from the animals.
实验大鼠一般自由采食，不过这种方法会导致肥胖以及自发性肿瘤的发生频率增加。要在不影响动物福利和科学结果的前提下，找到限制群居大鼠采食量的方法颇具挑战性。本研究采用了饮食板作为一种饮食限制方法。与传统的饮食限制方法相比，饮食板喂养允许群居，并且应该能提高动物福利。就动物模型的稳健性和结果的可转化性而言，喂养方式不影响生物学参数的昼夜节律很重要。在本研究中，评估了饮食板喂养对血糖、血清胃饥饿素、粪便免疫球蛋白A（IgA）和粪便皮质酮昼夜节律的影响。饮食板并未改变昼夜节律，这进一步证明了这种饮食限制方法的实用性，它应该有益于动物健康以及从这些动物身上得出的科学结果的有效性。
