The fructose analogue, 2,5-anhydro-d-mannitol, neither increases food intake nor inhibits estrous cyclicity in syrian hamsters. Schneider, Jill E. Department of Biological Sciences, Lehigh University, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania 18015
APStracts 3:0385R, 1996.
Hyperphagia and anovulation are both triggered by prior food deprivation or other treatments that decrease intracellular availability of metabolic fuels in most species studied. Syrian hamsters fail to show compensatory hyperphagia, but do show anestrus in response to these energetic challenges. In the present experiments, we examined food intake, plasma glucose levels and estrous cyclicity in Syrian hamsters in response to 2,5-anhydro-D -mannitol (2,5-AM), a fructose analogue that is thought to trigger eating in rats by depleting intracellular levels of ATP without initiating compensatory sympathoadrenal responses. In experiment 1, female estrous cycling hamsters were treated with 100, 200, 400 or 800 mg/kg 2,5-AM or the vehicle by intraperitoneal injection. Food intake was measured 1, 2, 4, 8, and 24 hours after treatment. There were no statistically significant increases in food intake in response to any dose of 2,5-AM. In experiment 2, blood samples were drawn at 0, 1, 3, 5, 7 and 25 h after hamsters were treated with 0 or 400 mg/kg 2,5-AM. 2,5-AM treatment resulted in a mild but significant decrease in plasma glucose levels similar to those seen in 2,5AM -treated rats, suggesting that 2,5- AM has similar effects on fuel metabolism in rats and hamsters. In experiment 3, hamsters received 2,5-AM, 2,5-AM + the fatty acid oxidation inhibitor, methyl palmoxirate (MP) or vehicle every 6 hours over the first 48 h of the estrous cycle and were tested for indices of estrous cyclicity at the end of the cycle. All hamsters showed normal estrous cycles, regardless of the treatment. If 2,5-AM has similar metabolic consequences in rats and hamsters, the present results suggest that decreased intracellular levels of ATP and mild hypoglycemia neither increase food intake nor inhibit estrous cyclicity in Syrian hamsters. In Syrian hamsters, mechanisms that increase food intake and inhibit estrous cycles are triggered under the same conditions that initiate compensatory sympathoadrenal responses.

Received 21 October 1996; accepted in final form 24 May 1996.
APS Manuscript Number R295-6.
Article publication pending Am. J. Physiol. (Regulatory Integrative
Comp. Physiology).
ISSN 1080-4757 Copyright 1996 The American Physiological Society.
Published in APStracts on 13 November 1996