Author(s): YUAN, L., Institution: TSINGHUA UNIVERSITY, Country: CHINA, Abstract-ID: 395

INTRODUCTION:
Obesity is a global epidemic phenomenon and can be accompanied by renal dysfunction or accelerating kidney diseases [1]. However, obesity-related kidney disease is easily ignored compared to diabetes, and hypertension-related kidney disease. Concurrently, intermittent fasting (IF) has greatly popular in weight loss due to its convenience of not requiring individuals to count calories and its ability to improve metabolic diseases [2]. Thus, we hypothesized that intermittent fasting could effectively prevent obesity-related renal dysfunction.
METHODS:
C57BL/6 mice were randomly divided into three groups (n=7 per group): control group (Con, chow diet), high-fat diet group (HFD, high-fat diet), intermittent fasting group (HFD+IF, high-fat diet). Mice in the Con and HFD groups were free access to food for 21 weeks. Mice in the HFD+IF group were free access to food for 13 weeks and then started IF for 8 weeks. At the end of the 21-week duration, we tested serum total cholesterol (TC), serum free fatty acid (FFA), glomerular area (GA), and circumference (GC) in all mice.
RESULTS:
(1) Compared to the Con group (TC: 1.93 ± 0.51; FFA: 153.75 ± 7.85; GA: 3286.86 ± 396.23; GC: 216.22 ± 13.19) the HFD group significantly increased TC (p<0.001), FFA (p<0.001), GA (p<0.001) and GC (p<0.001). (2) Compared to the HFD group (TC: 4.06 ± 0.58; FFA: 182.41 ± 6.49; GA: 5022.29 ± 534.80; GC: 265.80 ± 11.84), the HFD+IF group significantly decreased TC (p<0.001), FFA (p=0.001), GA (p<0.001) and GC (p<0.001).
CONCLUSION:
As hypothesized, high-fat diet–induced obesity mice were coincident with enlargement of the glomerular area and circumference, but intermittent fasting could prevent and improve it.