title: Intrauterine stress induces bone loss in adult offspring of C3H/HeJ mice having high bone mass phenotype but not C57BL/6J mice with low bone mass phenotype.
abstract: In this study we examined to what extent and how genetics may modify osteoporosis risk arising due to environmental stresses which act during the antenatal period of life and have the potential to induce bone loss in adulthood. C57Bl/6J (C57) and C3H/HeJ (C3H) mice were used as a model system. The mice were exposed to a single injection of 5-aza-2'-deoxycytidine (5-AZA) on day 10 of pregnancy and the structure and bone mineral density (BMD) of the femur and 3rd lumbar vertebra of 3- and 6-month-old male and female offspring were evaluated by micro-computed tomography (μCT). Besides, we also attempted to evaluate whether 5-AZA affects the expression of some osteogenic genes in the embryonic limb buds. The main observation of this study is that 5-AZA-induced loss of bone quality was registered in 6-mo-old C3H offspring but not in their C57 counterparts. We also observed that C57 and C3H embryos may differ in their response to 5-AZA-induced detrimental stimuli: whereas 5-AZA treated C3H embryos exhibited a decreased expression of Col1a1, C57 embryos exhibit a decreased expression of Sox9. Overall, our study, by thorough characterization of bone homeostasis in 3- and 6-month-old offspring of 5-AZA-exposed C57 and C3H mice, allows hypothesizing that the adaptive response to antenatal insults may be stronger in offspring inherently exhibiting a low bone mass phenotype than in offspring inherently exhibiting a high bone mass phenotype.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Medicine in the Galilee, Bar Ilan University, Safed, Israel.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Raygorodskaya
authors.affiliation: Tel Aviv University, Sackler School of Medicine, Tel Aviv, Israel.
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Gabet
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Medicine in the Galilee, Bar Ilan University, Safed, Israel.
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Shochat
authors.affiliation: Tel Aviv University, Sackler School of Medicine, Tel Aviv, Israel.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Kobyliansky
authors.affiliation: Tel Aviv University, Sackler School of Medicine, Tel Aviv, Israel.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Torchinsky
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Medicine in the Galilee, Bar Ilan University, Safed, Israel. Electronic address: david.karasik@biu.ac.il.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Karasik
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000818:Animals; D001862:Bone Resorption / Q000209:etiology* / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D001842:Bone and Bones / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology*; D005269:Femur / Q000473:pathology; D005317:Fetal Growth Retardation / Q000473:pathology*; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D008809:Mice, Inbred C3H; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D009929:Organ Size; D010012:Osteogenesis / Q000235:genetics; D010641:Phenotype; D055114:X-Ray Microtomography
keywords: Bone loss; Developmental origin of diseases; Genetic heterogeneity; Genome-by-environment interaction