F. Bozinovic et Ma. Mendez, ROLE OF DIETARY FATTY-ACIDS ON ENERGETICS AND TORPOR IN THE CHILEAN MOUSE-OPOSSUM THYLAMYS ELEGANS, Comparative biochemistry and physiology. Section A: Comparative physiology, 116(2), 1997, pp. 101-104
Citations number
16
Categorie Soggetti
Physiology,Biology
Journal title
Comparative biochemistry and physiology. Section A: Comparative physiology
We hypothetized that the Chilean mouse-opossum Thylamys elegans needs
micronutrients that are in fruits and seeds, and the unsaturated fatty
acids are such micronutrients that may allow individuals of this spec
ies to experience longer torpor bouts, lower body temperatures during
torpor and higher energy savings during wintertime. To test this hypot
hesis, we studied: 1) wintertime preferences by artificial diets rich
in saturated fatty acids, unsaturated fatty acids and control diets, a
nd 2) the effect of acclimation to dietary fatty acids on the energeti
cs and torpor patterns in this species. When individuals where allowed
to choose between the experimental diets they always selected the uns
aturated fatty acid diet. After 4 weeks of dietary acclimation, the av
erage daily metabolic rate was not significantly different among treat
ments, neither was minimum metabolic rate during torpor significantly
different, in spite of a tendency to lower values that was detected un
der unsaturated fatty acid treatment. A similar pattern was observed w
hen body temperature during torpor was compared among treatments. Two
explanations are proposed: 1) Acclimation time was not sufficient to o
btain statistical significance, but physiological differences and 2) m
etabolic rate during torpor are not affected by dietary lipids in this
species. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Inc.