Astaxanthin supplementation attenuates disuse muscle atrophy and myonuclear apoptosis in rat skeletal muscle

Prolonged skeletal muscle disuse results in muscle atrophy. Currently, no therapeutic treatment is available for the prevention of this problem. Nonetheless, growing evidence suggests that prevention of disuse-induced oxidative stress in inactive muscle fibers can delay inactivity-induced muscle atrophy. We recently tested the hypothesis that dietary supplementation with the antioxidant astaxanthin (AX) might protect against disuse muscle atrophy, in part, by preventing myonuclear apoptosis. Seven-day unloading resulted in reduced soleus muscle weight and myofiber cross-sectional area. However, this decline was suppressed by AX supplementation. Further, AX prevented disuse-induced increase in the number of terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick end labeling-positive nuclei. Our data showed that AX supplementation before and during hindlimb unloading attenuated soleus muscle atrophy, in part, by suppressing myonuclear apoptosis.