AJP - Endocrinology and Metabolism, Vol 245, Issue 1 74-E80, Copyright © 1983 by American Physiological Society
Effects of severe long-term food deprivation and refeeding on adipose tissue cells in the rat
W. H. Miller Jr, I. M. Faust, A. C. Goldberger and J. Hirsch
To determine whether it is possible to use diet to cause a loss of
adipocytes, adipose tissue cellularity was examined in adult male rats
subjected to unusually prolonged semistarvation. After 1 wk of total fast,
rats were given a nutritionally inadequate glucose-electrolyte diet for up
to 7 wk. This caused a 49% reduction of body weight, up to a 99% reduction
in the weight of adipose tissue, and significant losses of total adipose
tissue DNA content. Nevertheless, there was no evidence that fat cells had
been lost. The number of fat cells in the right epididymal depots of the
food-deprived rats equaled both the number seen in left depots after
refeeding and the number seen in corresponding depots of nonfasted
controls. Adipose tissue DNA synthesis, which declined 88% below control
values during fasting, did increase as much as 2,000% above control values
during refeeding. However, autoradiographs showed that the increase
reflects only the replacement of lost endothelial and nonadipocyte
mesenchymal cells; no labeled fat cell nuclei were found. Thus, severe,
long-term food deprivation followed by refeeding causes loss and recovery
of stromal-vascular cells in adipose tissue but no loss of fat cells.
