FUNCTIONAL ADAPTATION OF BONE: INTERACTIVE EFFECTS OF DIET AND MECHANICAL LOADING ENVIRONMENT

Abstract

Bones meet competing demands both structurally and metabolically with an ability to “functionally adapt” to the surrounding environment. Diets high in saturated fat and sucrose (HFS) can adversely affect bone by limiting calcium availability. Conversely, applying a mechanical stimulus, appropriate in magnitude, frequency, and rate has been shown to be osteogenic. Thus, we hypothesized that groups subject to a mechanical loading would incur skeletal benefits, whereas exposure to a HFS diet would adversely affect structural integrity. We also proposed that despite the osteogenic potential of loading stimuli, the calcium-limiting effects of a HFS diet would result in a net decrease in bone structural properties, when considered in combination.

Female mice underwent non-invasive exogenous cantilever bending of the right tibia with a 1Hz trapezoidal waveform for 60s, five days per week, for thee weeks. Loading was calibrated to induce peak strain magnitudes of 1000 microstrain. Mice were randomly assigned to one of two dietary cohorts: high-fat-sucrose (HFS, n=36) or adjusted starch diets (n=36). Mice were further subdivided into groups based on loading status: control, sham, or loaded. Upon sacrifice, tibiae were dissected; morphometrical and mechanical properties were assessed and compared.

Control mice fed a HFS diet had significantly reduced cross-sectional area, cortical thickness, maximal load, and energy to failure when compared to control mice fed the starch diet. No changes in material properties were seen. Mice eating a HFS diet as well as experiencing mechanical loading had significantly greater cross-sectional area, energy to failure, and maximal load when compared to control mice fed a HFS diet, but had reduced structural properties when compared with loaded mice within the starch cohort.

To date, bone structural properties, and not material properties were adversely affected as a result of ingesting a HFS diet. A diet effect was observed, between control mice fed a HFS diet and control mice fed a starch diet, with the former group experiencing the negative affects previously associated with HFS diets in rodents. Presently, a load effect was only observed within the HFS cohort.