The Restorative Effects of Graded Intensities of Exercise Training on the Biochemical and Nutritional Status of Obese Induced Male Wistar Rats (Rattus novegicus)

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the specific effects of 12 weeks of intensive graded intensities of exercise training on nutritional parameters and some plasma biochemical parameters in high-fat diet and sucrose obese induced (HFDS) Wistar rats.

In evaluating the restorative effects of graded exercise training as an intervention in managing obesity, 25 male Wistar rats who were 7 weeks old were used. These 25 rats were broadly grouped into 5 rats as control and 20 rats as experimental. In the first phase of the experiment which involved induction of obesity, the rats were fed on HFDS for 12 weeks, while the 5 rats in the control group were fed on a normal rodent diet. In the second phase which was the interventional phase, the 20 HFDS induced obese rats in were assigned into 4 groups randomly; control (sedentary group), low, medium, and high-intensity exercise training groups, and were subjected to various intensities of exercise training. After 84 days of exercise training intervention, the final body weight, the plasma biochemical parameters including the total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), and high-density-lipoprotein-cholesterol (HDLC) concentrations; and also nutrition parameters including feed efficiency (FE), feed consumption (FC) and caloric intake (CI) were assessed.

The study established that graded exercise training has a direct inverse proportional reduction in TC, TG, and LDLC concentrations. In conclusion, medium to high-intensity exercise training is associated with restoring the dyslipidemic profile in the serum of rats and also increasing feed efficiency.