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Mouse study finds age, disease change body temperature rhythms

Date:
January 13, 2022
Source:
University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences
Summary:
A new study finds that while young and healthy mice show clear differences between daytime and nighttime body temperature rhythms, in older and diseased animals the difference essentially disappeared.
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A new study finds that while young and healthy mice show clear differences between daytime and nighttime body temperature rhythms, in older and diseased animals the difference essentially disappeared.

In humans and other mammals, body temperature oscillates in a 24-hour rhythm. This daily rhythm in body temperature is a critical factor in regulating many physiological processes. The loss of this rhythm is an important marker of, and contributor to, disease.

In a study published in the journal Chronobiology International, UCLA Health researchers looked at body temperature rhythms in young and middle-aged mice, and in a mouse model of Huntington's Disease. They found that in young healthy mice, there is a distinct difference between the nighttime rhythm and daytime mode. At night, the young and healthy mice had strong higher frequency oscillations, while in the daytime, these body temperature oscillations were absent. But in the older and diseased animals, the night/day difference disappeared.

"In these older and diseased mice, as the song says, 'it's hard to tell the nighttime from the day,'" said Alan Garfinkel, Research Professor of Medicine and Integrative Biology and Physiology. "This loss of the ability to segregate daytime from nighttime rhythms may be a general phenomenon in health vs. disease, since virtually all hormones in the body have a similar pattern of nighttime vs daytime rhythms."


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Materials provided by University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


Journal Reference:

  1. Christopher G. Griffis, Janki Mistry, Kendall Islam, Tamara Cutler, Christopher S. Colwell, Alan Garfinkel. Circadian and ultradian rhythms in normal mice and in a mouse model of Huntington’s disease. Chronobiology International, 2022; 1 DOI: 10.1080/07420528.2021.2014516

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University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences. "Mouse study finds age, disease change body temperature rhythms." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 13 January 2022. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/01/220113151337.htm>.
University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences. (2022, January 13). Mouse study finds age, disease change body temperature rhythms. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 28, 2024 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/01/220113151337.htm
University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences. "Mouse study finds age, disease change body temperature rhythms." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/01/220113151337.htm (accessed March 28, 2024).

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