Fig. 1.

The experimental design. One-hundred and twenty young female Sprague Dawley rats were randomly allocated into 5 groups, each consisting of 24 animals. The animals in the baseline control group were euthanized after the acclimatization period. The remain of ninety-six animals were divided in a 1:1 ratio and fed ND or HFD and subjected to a 10-month study protocol as follows: half of the rats fed ND or HFD performed 30-min running exercise sessions on a treadmill. Six animals (2 vs. 4 rats fed ND and HFD, respectively) died prior to the end of the study and eighteen more (2 vs. 16 rats under ND and HFD) had to be excluded due to the development of tumours