Female Are Protected from Circadian Disruption-Induced Glucose Intolerance, Cardiac Fibrosis and Adipocyte Dysfunction.

Circadian disruption increases the development of cardiovascular disease and diabetes. We found that circadian disruption causes glucose intolerance, cardiac fibrosis and adipocyte tissue dysfunction in male sand rats, . Whether these effects occur in female is unknown. Male and female were fed a high energy diet and exposed to a neutral (12 light:12 dark, control) or short (5 light:19 dark, circadian disruption) photoperiod for 20 weeks. Circadian disruption impaired glucose tolerance in males but not females. It also increased cardiac perivascular fibrosis and cardiac expression of inflammatory marker in males, with no effect in females. Females had reduced proapoptotic mRNA and cardiac hypertrophy ratio. Cardiac protection in females occurred despite reductions in the clock gene . Circadian disruption increased adipocyte hypertrophy in both males and females. This was concomitant with a reduction in adipocyte differentiation markers and in males and females, respectively. Circadian disruption increased visceral adipose expression of inflammatory mediators , and and reduced browning marker in males. However, these changes were not observed in females. Collectively, our study show that sex differentially influences the effects of circadian disruption on glucose tolerance, cardiac function and adipose tissue dysfunction.