Figure 3. Impact of high fat diet on weight gain in mice of adipocyte lineage restricted dab2 deletion.

dab2 (fl/fl) mice were crossed with aP2-cre mice to produce mice in which dab2 gene was deleted only in adipocyte tissues (dab2 (fl/df);aP2-cre) (adipocyte-restricted dab2 knockout). (a) Both male and female adipocyte tissue-specific Dab2 deficient mice were challenged with a high fat diet starting at 7 weeks of age for an additional 28 weeks. The body weights were determined and compared with control littermates (dab2 (fl/+);aP2-cre). Student’s T-test indicates that the weight difference between the two genotypes is statistically significant (p < 0.005). (b) Adipose tissues were collected from the dab2 (fl/fl) and dab2 (fl/df);aP2-Cre mice, and protein extracts were prepared from the tissues for Western blot analysis. The Western blot indicates that both Dab2 p96 and p67 isoforms were absent in adipose tissues collected from 3 dab2 (fl/df);aP2-cre mice. (c) Blood chemistry analysis was performed on dab2 (fl/df) and dab2 (fl/df);aP2-cre mice that had been fed with an high fat diet but fasted for 12-hour before blood sampling. Results from 8 male mice in each group were averaged and standard errors are shown. The serum lipid and metabolite profiles are essentially identical between dab2 (fl/df) and dab2 (fl/df);aP2-cre mice. ALT, alanine aminotransferase.