Zhang Yanji, Li Jia, Wei Dan, Mo Guoyan, Yu Chaochao, Wang Lihua, Zhuo Yue, Xu Kou, Zhang Yingrong, Xue Yixuan, Huang Wei, Zhou Zhongyu
College of Acupuncture and Orthopedics, Hubei University of Chinese Medicine, Hubei Provincial Collaborative Innovation Center of Preventive Treatment by Acupuncture and Moxibustion, Wuhan, China.
Department of Acupuncture, Hubei Provincial Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Wuhan, China.
Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2020 Sep 24;2020:8764507. doi: 10.1155/2020/8764507. eCollection 2020.
Acupuncture has been widely used for obesity treatment, but its mechanism is still unclear. To investigate the molecular mechanisms, we applied electroacupuncture (EA) at the Zusanli (ST36) acupoint and treadmill exercise (TE) in a diet-induced obese (DIO) rat model and used RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) to identify molecular consequences. Forty Sprague-Dawley male rats were selected and randomly divided into five groups: control (C), DIO model (M), EA, TE, and EA + TE groups. According to the results, acupuncture reduced body weight and the ratio of retroperitoneal white adipose tissue (retro-WAT) to body weight. Total RNA was extracted from the retro-WAT from five groups for RNA-seq. Differentially expressed genes (DEG) analysis showed that there were obvious differences among the four comparisons of C vs. M, M vs. EA, M vs. TE, and M vs. EA + TE, followed by 1383, 913, 3324, and 2794 DE genes. Gene ontology (GO) term enrichment analysis and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway enrichment analysis were performed to further classify the DEGs. Several GO terms were commonly significantly enriched in both M vs. TE and M vs. EA, such as myofibril and muscle contraction. In addition, some pathways were regulated by EA and TE, such as the peroxisome proliferator activated receptor signaling pathway and calcium signaling pathway. This study is the first to compare and analyze the differences in gene expression profiles in the retro-WAT of rats in different groups, which provide a clue for further investigation into the molecular mechanisms of obesity treatment by EA and TE.
针灸已被广泛用于肥胖症治疗，但其机制仍不清楚。为了研究其分子机制，我们在饮食诱导肥胖（DIO）大鼠模型中，对足三里（ST36）穴位进行电针（EA）刺激和跑步机运动（TE）干预，并使用RNA测序（RNA-seq）来确定分子效应。选取40只雄性Sprague-Dawley大鼠，随机分为五组：对照组（C）、DIO模型组（M）、电针组（EA）、运动组（TE）和电针+运动组（EA+TE）。结果显示，针灸可降低体重以及腹膜后白色脂肪组织（retro-WAT）与体重的比值。从五组大鼠的retro-WAT中提取总RNA进行RNA-seq分析。差异表达基因（DEG）分析表明，C与M、M与EA、M与TE、M与EA+TE这四组比较之间存在明显差异，分别有1383、913、3324和2794个差异表达基因。进行基因本体（GO）术语富集分析和京都基因与基因组百科全书通路富集分析以进一步对差异表达基因进行分类。在M与TE以及M与EA比较中，有几个GO术语通常显著富集，如肌原纤维和肌肉收缩。此外，一些通路受电针和运动调控，如过氧化物酶体增殖物激活受体信号通路和钙信号通路。本研究首次比较分析了不同组大鼠retro-WAT中基因表达谱的差异，为进一步研究电针和运动治疗肥胖症的分子机制提供了线索。
