Serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine; 5-HT) is implicated in central fatigue, and 5-HT1A pharmaceuticals are known to influence locomotor endurance in both rodents and humans. We studied the effects of a 5-HT1A agonist and antagonist on both forced and voluntary exercise in the same set of mice. This cohort of mice was taken from 4 replicate lines of mice that have been selectively bred for high leve...

Involuntarily exercising rats undergo more physical and mental stress than voluntarily exercising rats; however, these findings still lack electrophysiological evidence. Many studies have reported that theta rhythm appears when there is mental stress and that it is affected by emotional status. Thus we hypothesized that the differences between voluntary and involuntary movement should also exis...

Selective breeding for high wheel-running activity has generated four lines of laboratory house mice (S lines) that run about 170% more than their control counterparts (C lines) on a daily basis, mostly because they run faster. We tested whether maximum aerobic metabolic rates (V(O2max)) have evolved in concert with wheel-running, using 48 females from generation 35. Voluntary activity and meta...

Plasma levels of corticosterone (B) respond acutely to exercise in all mammals that have been studied, but the literature contains conflicting reports regarding how chronic activity alters this response. We measured acute and chronic effects of voluntary activity on B in a novel animal model, mice selectively bred for high voluntary wheel running. Female mice were housed with or without wheels ...

Acute and chronic stress have been reported to have differing effects on physical activity in rodents, but no study has examined a chronic stress protocol that incorporates stressors often experienced by rodents throughout a day. To examine this, the effects of the Unpredictable Chronic Mild Stress (UCMS) protocol on voluntary running wheel activity at multiple time points, and/or in response t...

Voluntary wheel running in rats increases hippocampal brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) expression, a neurochemical important for neuronal survival, differentiation, connectivity and synaptic plasticity. Here, we report the effects of wheel running on BDNF and neurotrophin-3 (NT-3) protein levels in normal control mice, and in mice selectively bred (25 generations) for increased voluntar...

Exercise is a common component of weight loss strategies, yet exercise programs are associated with surprisingly small changes in body weight [1-4]. This may be due in part to compensatory adaptations, in which calories expended during exercise are counteracted by decreases in other aspects of energy expenditure [1, 5-10]. Here we examined the relationship between a rodent model of voluntary ex...

objective(s): the effect of maternal voluntary exercise on hippocampal bdnf level in rat offspring was studied. in addition, the possible role of hippocampal bdnf receptors in maternal exercise induced enhancement of learning in the rat pups was investigated.   materials and methods: pregnant rats have been randomly assigned to sedentary control or voluntary exercise groups. each of the exercis...

The endocannabinoid system (ECS) is involved in regulation of various physiological functions, including locomotion, antinociception, emotional states, and motivated behaviors. The ECS has been implicated in regulation of voluntary wheel running in mice via actions at the cannabinoid receptor-1 (CB1). Previously, we showed that four replicate lines of mice bred for high levels of voluntary whee...

Obesity is a major health problem, and increased food intake and decreased physical activity are considered as two major factors causing obesity. Previous studies show that voluntary exercise in a running wheel decreases not only body weight but also food intake of rats. We previously produced human growth hormone transgenic (TG) rats, which are characterized by severe hyperphagia and obesity. ...