Figure 8. Long-term weekly prednisone treatment increased endurance in female mice.

(A) Weekly prednisone–treated females had reduced whole-body percentage fat mass and increased percentage lean mass after 3 months of treatment. (B) Weekly prednisone–treated females showed increased distance to exhaustion in a treadmill run-to-exhaustion test compared with vehicle-treated females. (C) Weekly prednisone–treated females required fewer stimuli per kilometer run than vehicle-treated females. (D) After 9 months of treatment, weekly treated females had a slightly smaller visceral fat pad and moderately reduced percentage fat mass than vehicle-treated females. (E) Adipocytes in the visceral fat pad of weekly treated females had significantly reduced cross-sectional area compared with vehicle-treated females. Scale bars: 100 μm. (F) Some lipid metabolism genes continued to be upregulated in response to weekly prednisone. Data were analyzed with 2-way ANOVA (A and B) or Mann-Whitney test (C, E, and F).