Effects of Long-Term Voluntary Wheel Exercise on Male and Female Wistar Rats

Abstract

Male and female Wistar rats (n = 140) age 1.5 months were maintained in either wheel-cage units or cage units for their entire life span. Voluntary wheel exercise significantly increased the mean longevity of both male and female rats compared with that of control rats. Between and within groups, growth duration was positively related to longevity, and growth rate was negatively related to longevity. These factors may explain differences in longevity between exercise and control groups and differences in longevity between male and female groups. These factors of growth, here defined in terms of body weight increment, may possibly account for many instances of group differences in longevity

Effects of intrinsic aerobic capacity, aging and voluntary running on skeletal muscle sirtuins and heat shock proteins

“…Indeed, it has been shown that despite similar mitochondrial density, LCRs have reduced mitochondrial respiratory capacity in skeletal muscle compared to HCRs [33]. This is consistent with the finding, that skeletal muscle from obese subjects or from type 2 diabetic patients show reduced mitochondrial oxidative capacity [20,23,25,34]. A novel finding from the present study was that LCRs become promptly fatigued during maximal isometric muscle stimulation (Fig.…”

“…Modified from Edington et al 1972. More recently, two studies on specific-pathogen-free male Long-Evans and Wistar rats confirmed that exercise results in improved survival but does not improve maximal lifespan Goodrick 1980). In Goodrick's study the rats started the intervention at an age of 1.5 months and in Holloszy's at the age of 9 months.…”

Physiological, Metabolic and Running Characteristics of Senescent Female Hamsters

“…The hypoactivity observed in old ham sters in this study has also been reported for old rats allowed access to running wheels [Goodrick, 1980], Both the pattern and in tensity of spontaneous running were mark edly affected. Individual bouts of exercise were shorter, pauses were longer and speed was significantly reduced with age.…”

The effects of age and lifetime flight behavior on flight capacity inDrosophila melanogaster

“…For example, vigorous exercise training in humans and other mammals has been shown to increase cognitive capacity (Suominen-Troyer et al, 1986), locomotor performance (Skalicky et al, 1996), motor coordination (Dorner et al, 1997), antioxidant capacity (Gündüz et al, 2004;Kayani et al, 2008), resistance to cellular oxidative damage (Radák et al, 1999), immune function (Utsuyama et al, 1996) and lifespan (Paffenbarger et al, 1993;Lee and Paffenbarger, 2000). Alternatively, prolonged sedentarism in otherwise active mammal species can decrease running capacity (Swallow et al, 1998), lower the maximum rate of O 2 uptake (Overton et al, 1986;MacNeil and Hoffman-Goetz, 1993), increase body mass (Mlekusch et al, 1996;Swallow et al, 1998) and decrease lifespan (Goodrick, 1980;Holloszy, 1988;Franco et al, 2005;Bronikowski et al, 2006).…”