Abstract

Three months of exercise training (ET) decreases soluble Aβ40 and Aβ42 levels in an intensity dependent manner early in life in Tg2576 mice (Moore et al., 2016). Here, we examined the effects of 12 months of low-and high-intensity exercise training on cognitive function and amyloid plaque load in the cortex and hippocampus of 15-month-old Tg2576 mice. Low-(LOW) and high-(HI) intensity ET animals ran at speeds of 15 m/min on a level treadmill and 32 m/min at a 10% grade, respectively, for 60 min/day, five days/week, from 3 to 15 months of age. Sedentary mice (SED) were placed on a level, non-moving, treadmill for the same duration. ET mice demonstrated a significantly lower amyloid plaque load in the cortex and hippocampus that was intensity dependent. Improvement in cognitive function, assessed by Morris Water Maze and Novel Object Recognition tests, was greater in the HI group compared to the LOW and SED groups. LOW mice performed better in the initial latency to the platform location during the probe trial of the Morris Water Maze (MWM) test than SED, but not in any other aspect of MWM or the Novel Object Recognition test. The results of this study indicate that exercise training decreases amyloid plaque load in an intensity dependent manner and that high-intensity exercise training improves cognitive function relative to SED mice, but the intensity of the LOW group was below the threshold to demonstrate robust improvement in cognitive function in Tg2576 mice.

Department(s)

Biomedical Sciences

Document Type

Article

DOI

https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10020088

Rights Information

© 2020 The authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Keywords

Alzheimer’s disease, Amyloid plaque, Cognitive function, Exercise training, Tg2576 mice

Publication Date

2-1-2020

Journal Title

Brain Sciences

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