Treadmill exercise training improves the high-fat diet-induced behavioral changes in the male rats

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the efects of treadmill exercise training on obesity-induced behavioral changes in high-fat diet (HFD)-induced male rats. In this study, 40 male Sprague–Dawley rats were divided into 4 groups after they were weaned: Control (C), Exercise (E), Obese (O) and Obese+Exercise (O+E). For the obesity model % 60 high-fat diet were applied. After obesity was induced, rats were either moderate aerobic exercise (treadmill running) trained or left untrained. Diferent tasks to assess spatial learning and memory (Morris water maze test (MWMT)), depressive-like behavior (forced swimming test(FST), tail suspension test (TST) and anxiety-like behavior (light–dark test (LDT) and open feld test (OFT)) were conducted. Exercise caused a signifcant reduction in duration of immobility in the O group in FST and the decrease in immobility in the O+E rats in TST. The O+E rats demonstrated a signifcant increase in the time spent in the light box as compared to the O group in the LDT. The O+E rats did not show any behavioral alterations as compared to all the other groups in the OFT. In the O+E group, there was a signifcant increase in the time spent in the target quadrant compared to the O group in the MWMT. Our results support that treadmill exercise could improve cognitive, depressive-like, anxiety-like behavioral changes in the HFD-induced obese rats.